Psychotic megalomania? Absolutely; but also a… university thesis – and even more: an official state policy! This aphorism might be the starting point of a synopsis about the official Turkish ideology on the national question. Almost everyone in the Eurasian zone – except perhaps the Hellenes, Persians and… barbarians – owe almost everything to the Turks: their very existence, their language and culture, let alone their music!

“What about the Hellenes?”, some “Romioi” anxiously insist on asking, as they refuse to accept that they have either… never existed, or – most likely – are included among the “Romans” of the above mentioned citation quoted from the gold-bound kitabs of the sages.

“The question on the origin of the Yunans [Ionians] has been answered since the time of Homer”, is the smug reply. “The greatrhapsodewas also a Turk called Omer. Besides, the Europeans have preserved his name almost intact: Homer”!

Well, I’m not referring to freaks of a sick mind. It may be hard to believe but these ideas have been championed by academics! The “Great Idea” (Megale Idea) has died out in Greece(?) but in Turkey it’s alive and well and (wants to be) the master of the world…

The Kurdish languages belong to the Iranian branch of the Indo-European family. So they are related to Persian(Farsi), Indian Sanskrit, Hellenic and most European languages. Even… worse (for the Turkish linguists), all the ancient languages in the Anatolian area, still spoken or extinct, such as Hittite, have also been Indo-European.(a)

Asia Minor: the theory it may be the cradle of the Indo-European languages was distorted into a pseudo-theory they had a Turkic, let alone Turkish, origin, though: a) the most popular hypothesis postulates an Indo-European origin in the Pontic-Caspian steppe and expansion into E. Europe by the early 3rd millennium BCE; b) the earliest evidence of the Turkic languages as a separate group comes almost four millennia later in an early 8th century CE inscription found in Mongolia; c) the first reference to “Turks” appears in Chinese sources of the 6th century CE; d) Anatolia was invaded by the Seljuks in the 11th century, ultimately resulting in permanent Turkic settlement there.
Above: a Hattian pair of long-horned bulls
(copper, c. 2300-2000 BCE)

On the contrary, the Turkic languages (Turkish is just one of them), that are relatively newcomers in Asia Minor, belong to the Altaic family, together with the Mongolic. Some linguists group the Altaic and Uralic (or Finno-Ugric) languages together (in the Ural-Altaic family). No such hypothesis connecting the Altaic and Indo-European languages has been put forward. It doesn’t matter much to Ankara’s “scientists”. Thus they teach linguistics this way… à la turca:

“As is well known, the wordsoleilmeanssunin French. In the Turkic dialect of Yakut we can find the corresponding wordsilai.(b)As the ‘s’ of the Yakut dialect becomes ‘g’ in the other Turkic dialects, it is self-evident that the word comes from a Turkic root meaninglight. Nevertheless, the Turks prefer the more common Turkish wordgünes. But the proof of the Turkic origin of the word soleil has been a revelation of a great linguistic and scientific truth, from which most important conclusions are derived”…

(b) Dilmen defined Yakut (Sakha) as a dialect, although it is considered a language. Nationalist politics’ stranglehold on social sciences is very well known (Dilmen is a “good” example). That’s why there are no universally accepted criteria for distinguishing a language from a dialect. The most common, and most purely linguistic, criterion is that of mutual intelligibility. It seems logical but it’s far from scientific.
Once I was in Granada with two Italian girls searching for a place to listen to flamenco. I still remember my amazement when I heard those girls asking passers-by for information: they spoke in Italian, the others answered in Spanish, and there was absolutely no problem of mutual intelligibility! What does that mean? That Italian and Spanish are dialects? If so, of what language?(!)

Since I don’t like to be branded as a “nationalist”, I invoke a Turkish scientist in the true sense of the word, the sociologistİsmail Beşikçi,(c) a man who’s spent most of his life in Turkish prisons not because he has committed any crime, but because he’s had the courage to publicize his documented views. Beşikçi has been persecuted/prosecuted because he initially criticized (and later polemicized) the ruling ideology of Turkey as it was set forth in such “scientific” theses – and even more so because he has dealt with a taboo subject: the Kurdish question.(d)

Kurdish musicians (1890)

(c) Note that Beşikçi was born a Turk, not a Kurd. So he deserves our greatest admiration even more.

(d) The on-going conflict between Turks and Kurds dates back to the Turkish War of Independence, which established a Turkish nationalist state that has repressed the human rights of Kurdish people. The Kurds felt betrayed because they had taken part in almost every “dirty job” of the Turks from the late 19th century to the 1910s, mainly in the first ethnic cleansings of the 20th century, for they thought that they “cleared” the place for themselves. The perpetrators of the Armenian, Greek, and AssyrianGenocides (1.5 million + 900.000 + 400.000 = almost 3 million deaths) were Turks, Kurds, Muslim Caucasians, and Arabs: in reality it was genocide of heterodox people by the Islamists. But the Turks were primarily nationalists; so they also turned against the Kurds who then rebelled. Major historical events before the PKK revolt, include the Koçgiri, Sheikh Said, Ararat, and Dersim rebellions (1920, 1925, 1930, and 1938).

The citations quoted above (except that reference to Homer) are from Beşikçi’s book, Historical Thesis on Turkey / The Sun Language Theory and the Kurdish Question, which cost him three years in prison because he was “reckless” enough not to deny the existence of a nation… The first thing he took into account was the nature of the positions adopted in 1930 by Turkish “scientists” under the guidance of Mustafa Kemal (Atatürk)! Based on official documents, speeches and such “scientific” theses, Beşikçi analyzed the formulation and development of the ideology of Kemalism, exposing its unscientific, racist and chauvinistic nature. In one of his many apologies (speeches in defense of himself), he attacked the official “Justice” of the Kemalist regime:

İsmail Beşikçi

“As a repressive state mechanism, this court threatens writers and intellectuals with imprisonment, favours police measures and secret trials, condemns scientific thought, prefers the secret services reports against truth and sociological findings, imposes verdicts without – at least – taking into account the defense of the accused and, using loopholes, accepts the colonial oppression and tyranny, denying the reality of the existence of the Kurdish nation, which is an objective fact above the will of people and institutions.

“This court essentially acts as an administrative and political body with a seemingly ‘independent function’ and ‘independent judgment’. It functions just like the gendarmerie, police, national security services and other similar services, attempting to impose the hegemony of the official ideology through its verdicts. Rejecting an objective truth, your court is lying, considering the conclusions drawn by our systematic societal research, the reliable knowledge, and the rights we advocate, as incriminating evidence.

“This court acts like the gendarmerie, police, national security and other services, attempting to impose the hegemony of the official ideology
through its verdicts.” (İsmail Beşikçi)

Mustafa Kemal (Atatürk)

“In its verdicts regarding my books, your court states that ‘the sacred memory of Atatürk is stained’. What does that mean? It means that the Kurdish masses – men, women and children – will be continuously sent to exile, to the gallows, will be slaughtered, that laws and decrees will be shamelessly adopted on this logic – but anyone who criticizes such phenomena will be tried on the grounds of ‘libeling the sacred memory of Atatürk’. How can one consider genocide, exiles, the complete assimilation enforced in Kurdistan by the Kemalist regime as ‘sacred memory’? The division and partition of Kurdistan, the implementation of the tactics ‘divide and rule’ against the Kurdish nation, may be ‘sacred memory’ only for the imperialists and colonialists.

“The Turkish universities, on the other hand, as slaves of the official ideology, reject in principio scientific thought obscuring and denying the reality of the Kurdish nation. They consider the official ideology, which is based on fraud and indifference towards objectivity, as the only irresistible and definite reality. So they present this official ideology as scientific and legal. It is at this point that the ‘independent’ court and ‘independent’ judgment intervene, trying under threat of punishment to prevent any criticism of the university professors who, through political charlatanism, demand material and social privileges”…

This trial took place in 1979, one year before the so-called democracy was overthrown in a coup of the army, the then mighty pillar supporting the regime. More trials and convictions preceded and followed for Beşikçi. Even if he could live two or three lives, he would not have time enough to serve the 200 years in prison imposed on him in total. Released in 1999, he was sent back to court in 2010 – that is, after the collapse of Kemalism – for “propaganda”, because of an article entitled The rights of nations to self-determination and the Kurds, which cost him more 15 months in jail.

In January 1981 he sent a Letter to UNESCO from his prison, stigmatizing the decision of the Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization of the United Nations to declare that year as The Atatürk Year.(e) A new conviction followed. Undeterred he continued sending letters from the dungeons to international organizations that, of course, ended up in the hands of Turkish judges who imposed new sentences. Α letter to the Journalist Union of Switzerland e.g. cost him 10 years!

(e) Atatürk is the only person to receive such recognition by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization… Note that: a) education, science and culture suffered much because of his policies; b) the recipients of this recognition were in fact his heirs governing Turkey at the time: the military putschists; it was as if they were rewarded by UNSESCO for their… coup d’état in the previous year!

But even in his trials (where we lose count, indeed) with his apologies (several of these speeches have been put together in his book, Defense), he persevered with remarkable courage and selflessness so as to defend the rights of the Kurdish people relying only on the public’s sense of justice – a sense that has ceased to govern the actions of even the “competent” international organizations.

We imagine spontaneously that before us we have İsmail B personifying Josef K, Kafka’s main character in The Trial. But our association is rather incongruous: Beşikçi has not been a surreal figure of absurdist fiction but an indomitable hero of free thought and scientific knowledge, a symbol of our time – exactly because such people are rare today. However, he’s had the misfortune to be born in Turkey. Therefore, he will never be awarded a Nobel Prize!(f)

It’s not me, of course, the one who has politicized the issue of linguistics à la turca. The issue itself is profoundly political. Lay, if you will, the blame on Alain Gheerbrant who “cast the first stone” paralleling Atatürk to Âşık Veysel (see the previous Voyage 6). No doubt, the French researcher is not an isolated case: it constitutes the rule (which is why we take note of him). No need to say that there are even worse cases. One thing, you see, is to credit “exclusively” the Turks with Anatolian music and another thing is to act similarly with the music of Constantinople; especially if we bear in mind that the Ottomans spoke of Arabo-Persian music; only after the Republic was established, this music was described as Turkish, or even Ottoman.(g)

(g) There are cases of “friendly fire” on this issue, which is nevertheless anything but crucial. It’s just a matter of orderliness and correct terminology. See e.g. the starting point of the reflections of the Greek-born director of the French Institute of Anatolian Studies, Stéphane Yerasimos, in the booklet of a CD with old “Ottoman music” featuring, among others, compositions by Dimitrie Cantemir who was certainly not an Ottoman:(*)

Dimitrie Cantemir
on a Romanian stamp

(*) A great man of letters (philosopher, historian, composer, musicologist, linguist, ethnographer, geographer), Cantemir was a prince of Moldavia where he learned Greek and Latin and acquired a profound knowledge of the classics. He lived in forced exile for 23 years in Constantinople, where he studied at the Patriarchate‘s Greek Academy, wrote about music and also composed. How is it possible to classify his music as “Ottoman” when the composer also fought against the Ottomans as an ally of Peter the Great in the Russo-Ottoman War of 1710–11?

“This project of performing Ottoman music on original instruments”, wrote Yerasimos, “arose from a simple question: why not apply the method that has been already successfully followed in Europe for several decades, and try to re-discover the spirit and the performing style of the Ottoman music of the great period – the 17th and 18th centuries?”

Indeed, the empire created with the downfall of the once powerful Byzantine Empire was Ottoman for it was controlled by this tribe. But is this sufficient reason to classify also the music of post-Byzantine Constantinople under the same heading? My objection is simply due to the explicitly ethnic import of the term Ottoman as it means Turkish. On the contrary, the term Byzantine is supranational, referring in general to “the eastern part of the Late Roman Empire that, after the fall of Rome, continued as its successor until 1453”. It is well known that in both these empires, the Byzantine and Ottoman, culture was the collective work of all ethnicities living within their boundaries. Ethnic identities can be found only in those cultures that have been cultivated by peoples distinguished for the originality of their contributions to human civilization. If for example there has been no Phoenician civilization, given that the Phoenicians were heavily influenced by the Egyptians, Mesopotamians and Hellenes, likewise there has been no Ottoman civilization either. Let alone that compared to the Ottomans, the role the Phoenicians have played, e.g. in the spread of the alphabet, has been far more important.

“The melodic system peculiar to the Arabic-speaking peoples of the countries bordering on the Eastern and Southern shores of the Mediterranean is the result of a long evolution. It derives from the adaptation by the Arab conquerors of the ancient Greek, Persian, and Egyptian systems, which gradually developed into a unified and highly original art.

“‘Until the 13th century the theorists refer to Greek theories, but subsequently there arose a distinctly independent theory and an art, cultivated at the court of the Caliphs, which became increasingly refined and elaborate. Until the end of the 19th century, this art continued to develop under the influence of fresh Persian and Byzantine elements, which had become more prominent owing to the Turkish domination’ (d’Erlanger).”

“The melodic system of the Arabic-speaking peoples of the Mediterranean derives from the adaptation of the ancient Greek, Persian, and Egyptian systems. Until the end of the 19th century, this art continued to develop under the influence of fresh Persian and Byzantine elements.”
(Alain Daniélou, Rodolphe d’Erlanger)

The conclusions we can draw are astonishing, indeed: until the eve of their empire’s collapse, the Ottomans – at least in the domain of music – were still under the influence of the empire they had abolished before half a millennium! It was natural that the Arabic-speaking peoples, then vassals of the Ottomans in the region, were equally influenced. In this way the Byzantine echoe echoed, resonated throughout the Mediterranean: the Christians were influenced through Byzantine ecclesiastical chant at least until the 11th century when, due to the Schism, Gregorian chant became obligatory; the Muslims of the Ottoman Empire were equally influenced – not by ecclesiastical chant, of course, but by the erstwhile secular Byzantine music.

Persian influences may be considered natural, since the Iranians had already achieved their self-determination with their own independent state. But what can one say about Byzantine music, especially secular, which – supposedly – ceased to exist as soon as the state that gave birth to it was erased from the map? How could it possibly influence the Mediterranean on the eve of the 20th century and even impregnate it with “fresh” musical elements?

Trying to resume what Alain Daniélou and Rodolphe d’Erlanger have just said, and the thoughts they have provoked, we can imagine a historical model as follows: the Arabs, that is, those coming from the Arabian Peninsula, were cultivated adopting the ancient Hellenic, Persian, and Egyptian cultures. They knew, therefore, their empire could not last long if they were not able to assimilate the civilized Mediterranean peoples they had conquered. Under the circumstances, this could only happen through religion, first of all, and secondarily, language. It was absolutely necessary for the Arabs to break the ties of these ancient peoples with their glorious past by making them convert to Islam and – even better – adopt Arabic. That’s how they could exert undisputed control on their vast empire. All they needed was a combination of incentives and coercion. It was a rather moderate tactics compared with the one used for the Christianization of the Hellenes, with an outright violent campaign, a long, widespread genocide: see Chronicle 7+. “We Don’t Need No Thought Control!”).

The Arabs knew their empire could not last long if they did not assimilate the ancient peoples they had conquered. This could only happen through religion (Islam) and language (Arabic). They had to break the ties of these peoples with their glorious past. That’s how they could exert undisputed control on their vast empire…

When the Turks took over the Caliphate, they also adopted Arab culture that had sprung out like an amalgam from these ancient civilizations. Note that this synthesis started bearing fruit only in the 13th century, that is, after Constantinople fell for the first time to the Crusaders and Venetians in 1204. There was no similar cultural renaissance during the Ottoman period. That’s why there were still “fresh Persian and Byzantine influences” onto the Court music and art until the last days of the Ottoman Empire. What exactly was the Ottoman contribution? It was not so much musical but mainly political – through this wider, unified area – allowing these influences to have a greater impact on every corner of the empire.

Salah el Mahdi

According to the Tunisian Professor Salah el Mahdi, who spoke at the musicological symposium of Delphi on Rhythms, Modes and Scales of Mediterranean Music in 1988, the Near East was influenced by the so-called Turco-Byzantine music:

“Arab culture”, he stressed, “is an integral and significant part of the Mediterranean culture. The modes of Arabic music are classified into four major schools:

“a) The Maghreb School; it is represented by the Arabo-Andalusian musical heritage introduced into the area by the Arabo-Andalusian refugees in the 14th and 15th centuries. This music survives today across North Africa, along with the old music of the Libyan people of this region.(h)

(h) Ancient Libya: the name referred to a) the region west of the Nile Valley, corresponding more or less to the modern Maghreb (North Africa except Egypt); b) the country immediately west of Egypt; or c) to the whole of Africa that was still more or less terra incognita. Herodotus wrote that the Phoenicians carried out the first periplus of “Libya” (Africa) on behalf of the Egyptians. Talking about the Libyan people, Mahdi most probably referred to the Berbers and the rest of the Maghrebis.

“b) The Near East School; it is represented by the musical heritage of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine and, of course, Egypt. In part, this school has influenced Libya and Tunisia, which thus participate in two schools, as they are found in between. The Near East School has been influenced by the old Turco-Byzantine music, extending to the Balkans and Caucasus.

“c) The Arabo–Persian School; it is represented by the Abbasid musical heritage created in their great capital, Baghdad. It’s been the musical act in Iraq, Iran and all the [former] Soviet Republics of Central Asia as far as China.

“d) The Arabian Peninsula School; it includes Saudi Arabia, Yemen, all the Emirates and the Sultanate of Oman, and has had a twofold influence: from India and Africa.”

Now that we are sufficiently informed, and also have the necessary standard of comparison, we may have some fun enjoying Bernard Mauguin’s sophistries:

“Born in the shadow of Islam, Turkish classical music has been confused early in its history with art music of Persia and the Arab peoples. This common origin has been the cause of a persistent misunderstanding and, in general, little distinction is made between these various musical forms, which are usually grouped together under the vague heading of ‘Oriental music’…

“However, just as a knowledgeable listener can easily distinguish a work of Bach from a work of Berlioz, he could never confuse the playing of a Turkish musician with that of an Arab or an Iranian musician. Classical Turkish music has its own distinct personality”…

Johann Sebastian Bach

So we are talking about such colossal differences: those between Bach and Berlioz! Who would have the guts to disagree? But these were differences of eras, between two composers (one baroque, the other romantic) who created in the same tradition of Occidental “classical” music during the so-called common practice period (baroque, classical, romantic). Racial differences (German vs. French) were rather insignificant. The same applies to the distinction among Turkish, Arab and Iranian musicians: their main difference, especially before the creation of national states, was also a difference of eras. If Mauguin had compared Bach not with Berlioz but with Brahms, he would have noticed that they too are “easily distinguishable”. But such a comparison between two composers of common origin (both Bach and Brahms were Germans) would have deprived him of any pretext for his chicaneries…

Bach vs. Berlioz: not German vs. French music but
baroque vs. romanticism (plus genius vs. average…)

There is no doubt that if instead of Western theorists we had their Oriental colleagues, things might have been even worse, since everyone would have “trumpeted one’s own merchandise”. Mahdi in Delphi e.g. spoke of Turco-Byzantine music because he was not a Turk; that’s why he gave no due emphasis to the role of Persian music theorists, something that the Iranian Hormoz Farhat did; but he in turn “forgot” the contribution of Byzantine music, which Simon Karas put forward at the forefront – and so on…

What the Orient needs is an era of Renaissance and Enlightenment – something that the Occident intentionally obstructs for its own advantage and interests. These interests, I’m afraid, have been served, consciously or not, by those Western theoreticians who can’t see the forest for the trees (or, if you like, focus on the finger and can’t see it’s pointing to the moon), emphasizing the secondary – the local differences in music – and minimizing the primary – its common features. It is the classic recipe: Divide et impera!

● Hellenes in Portugal ● Moera-Fate and Fado ● Odysseus and Calypso in Lisbon; Their Son in Santarém ● Creto-Iberian Ties: Bull Leaping and Fights

The caption read: “Mosaic of a Phoenician trading ship”(!) Almost every word is a lie: the ship is neither Phoenician, nor trading; and underneath we can read in BIG, Hellenic letters: ODYSSEY… (Inopportune comments of someone unable to read Greek)

“IN REMOTE TIMES, even prior to the 6th century BC, the Greeks colonised what is now Portuguese territory, exploiting mines, founding and fortifying towns, especially along the coast and in the basins of the larger rivers.”

We have started with a passage from Augusto Mascarenhas Barreto’s book Fado / Origens Líricas e Motivação Poética (Lyrical Origins and Poetic Motivation). It is one of his initial remarks in the first chapter (Identity and Origins), just after the preliminaries about fado: Portugal’s urban folk song was born in two of its oldest cities, Lisbon and Coimbra (with a distinct form in each); it’s Provençal in origin with Arabic melodic and poetic influence; it’s a way of life (like rebetiko, flamenco, blues, tango, and any other authentic folk mode of expression however “humble” or “marginal” it is considered in origin); it’s dominated by nostalgia, by saudade, a keyword in fado also coming from the Arabs, and found corrupted elsewhere, as well: it is Cape Verde’s sodade characterizing its nostalgic song, morna.

The Hellenes, says Mascarenhas Barreto, “mingled with the aboriginal inhabitants and with the Iberians, who inherited from them certain ethnic and cultural characteristics. It is presumed that the Iberians were a people originating in the East of Europe. Iberus was the ancient name of the River Ebro, in Spain.”

Among the cultural characteristics that the Greeks bequeathed to Iberia (the Iberian Peninsula), Barreto points out Moera:

“The Hellenic Moira is to be found in the spirit of Fado… The word fado, derived from the Latinfatum, means fate, destiny – what has been foretold by the Oracle and which nothing can alter… Later, Moira became allied to Arab Fatalism.”

“The Hellenic Moira is to be found in the spirit of Fado”.
(Mascarenhas Barretο)

You see then that foreigners attribute to the Greeks cultural characteristics that the latter claim they are due to 400 years of (Ottoman) yoke…

Much more impressive is what Portuguese mythology says about the Iberian adventures of that “man of many ways”, “man for wisdom”, “of many wiles”, “of many turns”, “of twists and turns”, “of much resource”, the “skilled”, “ingenious” and “very resourceful” man,(a)Odysseus (see also Chronicle 6: Iberian “El Dorado”):

“Legend”, Barreto says, “attributes the building of the ancient walls of the city [of Lisbon] to the great Greek hero of antiquity, Ulysses, king of Ithaca and conqueror of Troy, who is supposed to have given the place the name of Ulissea – whence the word Ulissipo.(b) Anyway, what is certain is that Lisbon was inhabited by the Phoenicians about 600 BC, and they named it Alis Ubbo, meaning ‘Calm Bay’.(c) It was certainly visited by Greeks and Carthaginians, who established trade relations with the primitive peoples inhabiting the country.(d) These tribes, who had mingled with the Celts and the Iberians, formed an ethnic sub-group: the Celtiberians.

“Legend attributes the building of the ancient walls of Lisbon
to the great Greek hero of antiquity, Ulysses [Odysseus]” (Barretο)

(b)Ulissea, i.e. Odyssey, from the Latin version of the hero’s name, Ulysses or Ulisses, hence Ulissípolis (Odysseupolis) > Ulissipo or Olisipo.

The “Snake God” found in Tavira – the only Portuguese town, next to Huelva, where the Phoenicians actually settled

(c) Ulysses’ Ulissipo is a “legend”, according to Barreto, but the Phoenicians’ Alis Ubbo is a “certainty”: it’s the “classical” historical… science fiction. How can he combine this conclusion with his starting point that “in remote times, even prior to the 6th century BC, the Greeks colonised what is now Portuguese territory”? Well, “what is certain is that”… if we are based on facts, neither the Hellenes, nor the Phoenicians or the Punics ever settled in Portugal. The latter could not compare with Andalusia that magnetized all the above due to its mineral wealth and strategic importance. The only area of Portuguese interest that drew their attention was the also mineral-rich Galicia (by the way, I mean, of course, Galicia of Iberia and not that of Eastern Europe)!

(d) Alis (or Allis) Ubbo (or Ubo) is generally interpreted also as “Safe” (or “Pleasant”, “Enchanting”, “Serene”, “Delightful”) “Harbour” (or “Port”, “Haven”, “Gulf”, “Cove”, “Shore” “Inlet”): all versions describe a good anchorage and, therefore, all have something to do with the sea. In an article about the Mycenaean presence in Sardinia, Demetris Michalopoulos wrote, inter alia:

“In ancient times, Cagliari, the current capital of Sardinia, was called Caralis. In all likelihood, the place name derives from the Semitic word car, which means ‘white rock’”.

We assume that Caralis meant Bay (or Harbour, etc.) with a white rock, a toponym the omnipresent Phoenicians must have given. Can we associate the Semitic alis with the Indo-European root sal– (e.g. the English salt, and the Greek ἅλς (hals), meaning both salt and sea)? If so, Indo-European and Semitic languages should have had some common ground – at least on matters of common interest like navigation: this common ground was possibly formed by loan words from Mediterranean languages such as MinoanCretan…

“During the Punic Wars – between Rome and Carthage – the Iberian Peninsula was invaded by the Romans and, in 205 BC the town – then called Olissipo – was raised to the category of a Roman municipium. In 100 AD it was named Felicitas Julia, in honour of Julius Caesar, and the name was a promise of good fortune. In the year 376, the Visigoths invaded the peninsula. In 404 the territory was still occupied by Romans and barbarians, but in 522, after the departure of the Romans, a single Visigoth kingdom was formed, and the town came to be known as Olissipona. In 711 the Arabs invaded the peninsula from North Africa and occupied the town, to which they gave the name Lissibona… In 1147 Lisbon was re-conquered by Dom Afonso Henriques.”

Olissipo-Lisboa with the port on the Tagus in the 16th century

That’s how we “arrived” to Lisboa, the current capital of Portugal. But this is not the end of Barreto’s story. There’s more to it:

“Santarém, [which] stands looking over the River Tagus… is believed to have been founded in the 10th century BC by Abidis [Habis], of Greek origin, who gave it the name of Esca-Abidis. This prince, grandson of Gregoris [Gárgoris], king of the Iberian Peninsula, is also said to have founded the town of Astorga (Astigi) in Spain. According to legend, he was also the son of Ulysses: betraying the trust of Gregoris after having been given Alis-Ubbo (Lisbon), Ulysses secretly espoused Calypso, daughter of the peninsular king, who rushed with his army on Lisbon. Ulysses fled by sea, abandoning his spouse”…

“Santarém is believed to have been founded in the 10th century BC
by Abidis [Habis], son of Ulysses and Calypso”. (Barretο)

Consequently, Calypso was not a nymph on the Isle of Ogygia, as Homer says. Deviating from the greatest of the rhapsodes, the Lusitanians adopted Calypso as a princess of Iberia and daughter of Gregoris/Gárgoris, not Atlas. Note that we remain in the same places that Heracles had toured earlier for the golden apples of the Hesperides and Geryon’s cattle. It is assumed that Ogygia must have been nearby the Pillars of Heracles, since Odysseus had to travel for 18 days in an easterly direction to reach Scheria, the Phaeacian island, which many identify with Corfu. There’s a chance that Ogygia was one of the Pillars, today’s Spanish Ceuta on Moroccan soil, opposite the other Pillar, the Rock of Gibraltar. Although it’s not an island now, it may have been still an island in the days of Homer.

According to Hesiod, the conqueror of Troy – and also of numerous… women (for he was so “skilled”, “ingenious” and “resourceful”) – had in total 16 sons and a daughter from six women. In this long list, however, no child called Abidis, Habis, or something similar, is included. Odysseus had three sons from Penelope, one from the daughter of Thoas the Aetolian, eight sons and a daughter from Circe, two sons from Calypso, one from Callidice, the queen of Thesprotia, whom he later married, and another from Euippe, daughter of Tyrimmas, king of Dodona in Epirus. Note that if we accept Hesiod’s genealogy of Odysseus, with nine children from Circe and two from Calypso, we must reverse the time that, according to Homer, he lived with the two nymphs (one year with Circe and seven with Calypso).

With such a “proliferation”, of course, Odysseus was in danger to fall by the hand of… some offspring of his – something that did happen in the sequel of the Odyssey, in the Telegony or Thesprotis, the Epic Cycle’s final episode, attributed to Eugammon of Cyrene or Cinaethon of Sparta. Circe’s son, Telegonus, so the story goes, while searching for his father, landed on Ithaca where – according to the favourite custom of the era – started plundering and slaughtering, among others, also his genitor. Realizing he had become a patricide, he was overwhelmed with remorse, collected Odysseus’ body and, accompanied by his half-brother, Telemachus, and Penelope, voyaged back to the island of his mother, who turned them immortal. The “saga” ends there with a happy end worthy of… a Greek film of the ’60s: with the marriages of Circe with Telemachus and Penelope with Telegonus! Finally, only poor Odysseus was enveloped by murky darkness!

A similar end awaits our hero in Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, as well. The father of Italian poetry presents a traditional variation of the Homeric version, in which Odysseus himself says that he never returned to Ithaca. From Circe’s island, Aea, Aeaea or Aeaeë,(e) he went through the Pillars of Heracles into the Atlantic, crossed the Equator, sailing in the southern hemisphere for five months, until he reached a very high mountain. Then a tornado had the ship spin three times and sink. They all drowned there. But where? Was it in the “underworld”, or the in “new world”, America? Logic, based on today’s knowledge about the world, makes us draw wrong conclusions. Moreover, the narrative takes place in Dante’s Inferno (see also Sailing to Rio de Janeiro!).

(e) Here we have another homonymous toponym with the capital of Colchis, Aea (today’s Kutaisi). But in this case there’s an explanation: Circe was the sister of Aeëtes, the king of Colchis, and aunt of Medea, with whom she shared magic powers – and also temperament: Some say Circe was exiled to the solitary island of Aeaea by her subjects and her father for killing her husband…

Statue of Viriato in Zamora: The greatest Lusitanian hero in the resistance against the Romans was killed with treachery. When his assassins asked the Romans for their payment, the latter answered: “Rome does not pay
traitors who kill their chief!”

The Lusitanians, however, didn’t bother to… “set out for Ithaca” with Cavafy, nor cared about Odysseus after he escaped leaving Calypso behind. Naturally, they were concerned about what was going on “at home” and thus they paid much more attention to Abidis/Habis:

“When Abidis was born, Gregoris ordered him to be thrown in a cave to be devoured by wild beasts. In answer, however, to the entreaties of his daughter, he consented that the child should be delivered to Fate, according to primitive custom, and the boy was put in a basket and taken away by the current of the river [Tagus].(f) A hind adopted him and when the child was later found in a wild state by some huntsmen, his mother recognised him by a mark. Gregoris forgot his former anger and gave him schooling, so that he could succeed him in the government of the peninsula. The name Esca-Abidis (Escalabis) in Greek means ‘food of Abidis’,(g) in memory of the place where he was reared by the hind.

“As regards history, the Romans rebuilt the town in 153 AD and called it Scalabis-castrum. Julius Caesar raised it to the status of a capital – one of the four in Lusitania… In the year 500 when the Visigoths came to Lusitania, the barbarians and Lusitanians formed in that region a single people. In 632 the town of Tomar was the scene of the martyrdom of Irene… a nun. Her body, thrown into the river, was carried down as far as Scalabis… Nineteen years later, King Recceswinth, who was Catholic,(h) changed the name of Scalabis to Santa Irene. When… the Arabs occupied the town (715), they called it Chantireyn” – and that’s how we “arrived” to Santarém.

(h) Force of habit: “Catholic” is what Barreto wrote, instead of “Christian”, as he should, because the Schism was still to come…

The Graeco-Iberian ties date back to much earlier times than the Trojan War, to the Minoan thalassocracy in the Mediterranean. A common cultural characteristic of Cretans and Iberians was bull worship: bull-leaping.

Taurocathapsia (bull-leaping), Minoan fresco

In his Memoriae Historicae,Strabo, geographer and historian of the Roman era, who was born in Amaseia of Pontus (64-63 BCE) and died probably in Rome (24 CE), referred to the Lusitanian equestrian bullfight (…“the peoples of the coastline, who are fond of meeting, on horseback, the fierce Hispanian bulls”, he wrote).(i)

(i) The ancestor of the Iberian bull, aurochs, was described by Julius Caesar as “somewhat smaller than an elephant, swift and powerful; attacks both men and animals.”Charlemagne hunted a similar animal, known as bubalo. It is likely that the savage creature killed by St George was an aurochs and not a dragon as the plastic artists present him. The aurochs (aur = wild + ochs = ox), or urus, is the bos primogenius which is now extinct. It survived until 1627 in a forest of Poland.

Apart from bullfighting on horseback, there was also the pega – from the verb pegar, which means catch, seize… the bull by the horns! In one kind of pegas, the so-called forcado was not only completely unarmed, but had nothing to fool the attacking bull (e.g. cape). He should withstand the initial impact (the tremendous weight of the animal plus speed), and also the subsequent shaking of the bull’s head so as to get rid of an unwelcome rider on his neck.

There were more forcados, usually eight, as assistants in the pega to master the bull. It is the picture we have from the Minoan bull-leaping in an extant fresco of Taurocathapsia dating from the 15th century BCE. Isn’t it impressive? Even more if we take into account that these Cretan “forcados” included women!

Arriving at the other side of the Mediterranean, we find the earliest known description of such a bullfight in the Epic of Gilgamesh, the legendary hero of Mesopotamia, whose name became associated with his futile struggle to obtain immortality. The epic, dating back to ca 2100 BCE, describes how the hero and his companion Enkidu kill the Celestial Bull that the goddess Ishtar has sent to punish Gilgamesh for spurning her advances: “Enkidu seizes the celestial bull by the horns” while Gilgamesh “approaches it slowly and jumps on its back; then grabs it by the tail”…

“The pegas”, Barreto concludes, “probably originated in the Neolithic ritual hunts. We may wonder whether the peoples of the Iberian Peninsula learnt this from the Cretans of the 3rd millennium BC, or if they themselves may have been the teachers, since the bulls were taken from their natural habitat in the peninsula to the island of Crete.”

But when you talk about so extensive exchange going on five millennia ago – whether it is bull-leaping or bull shipments from Iberia to Crete – how is it possible to be concerned about trivial “problems” as to who were the initiators of this practice?

Man made the first giant leap in the Fertile Crescent
with the Neolithic agricultural revolution

Neolithic baker

There is, of course, a view that this second revolution marked a return to barbarism. But let us stick to generally accepted ideas for the time being. Even common sense says that the key was the first step; when hunters and gatherers became pastoralists and farmers. The development most probably was brought about by women: gathering fruit was their responsibility together with children, while men hunted. Therefore, agriculture, especially farming, the main aspect of the rural economy emerging then, was an innovation brought forth by women.(a)

(a) That sexual division of labour explains numerous differences in mentality between sexes that still characterize them, causing misunderstandings in their relationships.

As we know, a farmer is much more bound to the land than a hunter-gatherer or a pastoralist. Thus, the transition to farming led to the creation of permanent settlements that gradually grew: they became villages, some of them towns, or even cities. The latter – as the Hellenic and Latin words polis (πόλις) and civitas make clear – brought forth both politics and civilization. Man began his gradual transformation into what Aristotle would much later call a “political animal”, identifying a new distinctive feature of Homo sapiens vis-à-vis the other animal species.

The transition to farming led to the creation of settlements
that gradually grew: they became villages, towns, cities.
The latter brought forth both politics and civilization.

Cities require central authority and hierarchy, imposing monuments, division of labour and specialization. They necessitate the arts and crafts, commerce, architecture, pottery, metallurgy… The Mediterranean periplus began tentatively at that time, in parallel with the caravan routes along land roads that nevertheless remained dangerous. Consequently, so long as man familiarized himself with the sea, he’d rather sail than travel on land. It sounds a bit like an oxymoron that the liquid element is far more “solid” and safe, but that’s how it is.

Of course, the exchange of commercial goods is accompanied with the exchange of ideas, aesthetic patterns, intellectual “goods”, innovations. In this manner the new way of life spread rapidly inside and outside the Mediterranean basin, reaching eastwards as far as the Indian subcontinent and beyond: the Indo-Mediterranean contacts date back to at least the third millennium BCE.

The exchange of commercial goods is accompanied with the exchange of ideas, aesthetic patterns, intellectual “goods”, innovations.

The conditions were already ripe for the next colossal step: writing. Even though the reasons for this great innovation were initially bureaucratic (administrative record keeping, transfer of orders and messages), the invention and subsequent simplification of writing with the alphabet was indispensable as a condition for the systematic transfer of knowledge from one generation to the other and, of course, for the cultivation of literature and the arts – fields where the Greeks excelled.

Anyway, one needs to turn his back to the temptation of nationalist simplifications, although the ancient Hellenes have been a universal point of reference. The “Eastern threat” was there even then: it was the Persians. But Oriental knowledge was there, as well: any self-respecting philosopher wishing to be wise would go there for his “PhD”! It was the Orient where innumerable artifacts and ideas originated, along with the necessary know-how. Everything imported and adopted, however, had to be adapted according to the local needs and tastes; and some went by the wayside…

Alexander

There are several historical oxymora in this era. One of them concerns the differences between the Aegean and the Orient in their political structures. The decentralized Greek city-states flourishing in the Iron Age, i.e. in classical times, had few Oriental equivalents: the Sumerian and the Phoenician cities. On the contrary, the prevailing state entities in the East were centralized empires of both the Bronze and Iron Ages. Despite all that, the mighty Achaemenid Empire was repeatedly defeated and humiliated by the ‘Amphictyony’ of the Hellenes – except the… Thebans and several other Quislings of the time (μηδίσαντες [medísantes], those who surrendered to the Persians-Medes and fought on their side).(b)

We can very well imagine
how completely indifferent the Spartans would have been
to this inscription. “Except the Lacedaemonians”—naturally. The Spartans
weren’t to be led and ordered around
like precious servants. Besides,
a pan-Hellenic expedition without
a Spartan king in command
was not to be taken very seriously.
Of course, then, “except the Lacedaemonians.”

That’s certainly one point of view. Quite understandable.

Constantine Cavafy,
by Panaiotes Daphiotis

So, “except the Lacedaemonians” at Granicus,
then at Issus, then in the decisive battle
where the terrible army
the Persians mustered at Arbela was wiped out:
it set out for victory from Arbela, and was wiped out.

And from this marvelous pan-Hellenic expedition,
triumphant, brilliant in every way,
celebrated on all sides, glorified
as no other has ever been glorified,
incomparable, we emerged:
the great new Hellenic world.

We the Alexandrians, the Antiochians,
the Seleucians, and the countless
other Greeks of Egypt and Syria,
and those in Media, and Persia, and all the rest:
with our far-flung supremacy,
our flexible policy of judicious integration,
and our Common Greek Language
which we carried as far as Bactria, as far as the Indians.

Talk about Lacedaemonians after that!…

Alexander’s empire

So much for the phrase “except the…”, that’s always been very “trendy” in Hellas. As for the “medisantes” (derived from the Medes, Media, to which Cavafy also referred), they have indeed flooded the country! Among others, they include even the man who triumphed in the naval battle of Salamis: Themistocles. His successors have so much ballooned that a list with their names is almost impossible. They are well-known and visible, nevertheless: they mostly crowd the corridors and salons of the ruling elite…
But why “In the Year 200 B.C.”? Why Cavafy alludes in his title to a later date? We ignore the poet’s intention… That year, however, the 2nd Macedonian war broke out ending three years later with Rome’s victory over Macedon. It was the beginning of the end because since then Greece fell under full Roman control.

“The neck of the Greek the yoke will not abide,” one could very well say. OK, but this was a result of objective conditions. It was not so much that the Hellenes did not want, but rather did not need an imperial administration. What for them was an extraordinary situation that required collective and comprehensive effort, for the Easterners was an everyday struggle with an opponent much more powerful than the mightiest empire: Nature itself…

It was not so much that the Hellenes did not want,
but rather did not need an imperial administration…

Babylonian map of canals and irrigation systems West of the Euphrates (1684-1647 BCE)

Expanding his presence in an environment of rather great contrasts, which would be barren without the Nile, Tigris and Euphrates, with the waters in abundance but also with floods and cataclysms lurking, the Easterner realized the need for coordination of the efforts of all communities. Next to deserts, symbolizing the constantly present absolute evil, these rivers were a blessing from heaven but had unpredictable behaviour: therefore, they should be tamed. Major public works, especially for irrigation, were a prerequisite for human survival; commerce, as well, for the supply of these communities with absolutely necessary raw materials, and also luxury goods.

No need to say these two networks, irrigation and (state-controlled) trade, necessitated centralized power that should inspire fear. Those in power obviously needed law-enforcement agencies: the army and clergy. They needed imposing, majestic palaces, monuments, temples. It is what Karl Marx called the “Asiatic mode of production” and is the key to understanding Oriental despotism. A by-product is the relative – or ostensible, as others say – stagnation and immobility that has characterized these societies for millennia until now.

Irrigation and trade necessitated centralized power that should inspire fear. Therefore, it needed law-enforcement agencies: the army and clergy.
It was absolutely impossible for democracy to grow on Babylonian soil.

Babylon

Let us not forget, however, that these societies cultivated astronomy, mathematics, geometry – for the same reasons they invented writing; societies that created wonders like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon – although hanging by a thread: the infrastructure that had made them great was also their Achilles’ heel. You can realize that with just a look at the ruins of Babylon conquered and pillaged by time.(c) It was absolutely impossible for democracy to grow on Babylonian soil.

(c) When this text was written, Babylon had not been conquered also by the Americans. Yet the conquerors were conquered in turn, as well! But the price was heavy: disregarding the consequences, the US forces built a military base on Babylonian ruins. Dr. John Curtis of the British Museum described how the archaeological site was in some parts levelled to create a landing area for helicopters and parking lots for heavy vehicles. The occupation forces, he wrote,

One of the dragons from the Ishtar gate

“caused substantial damage to the IshtarGate, one of the most famous monuments from antiquity […] US military vehicles crushed 2,600-year-old brick pavements, archaeological fragments were scattered across the site, more than 12 trenches were driven into ancient deposits and military earth-moving projects contaminated the site for future generations of scientists […] Add to all that the damage caused to nine of the moulded brick figures of dragons in the Ishtar Gate by soldiers trying to remove the bricks from the wall.”

It is well known that American soldiers, as well as other personnel from the “Coalition of the willing” invaders of Iraq (e.g. Poles, who were also stationed in Babylon), looted many antiquities, which found their way to private collections.

The Oriental despots, satraps and tyrants were “necessary evils”. And, as there is always a match between worldly and heavenly powers (the concept of monarchies held “by the Grace of God” is in fact quite ancient), equally almighty and omnipotent, terrible and frightful, have been the Oriental gods; especially since they’ve been left alone with no competition at all, after all their antagonists had been “treated accordingly” by the clergy of the new monotheistic religions.(d)

The Oriental despots, satraps and tyrants were “necessary evils”. Equally almighty, terrible and frightful were the Oriental gods. No comparison with the Olympians, who were full of shortcomings, that is, they were human…

No comparison whatsoever with the Olympians who were full of shortcomings, that is, they were human, made in the image of the mortals that had created them, the Greeks, their way of life and their society – or, rather: societies, for Hellas, its topography, generated decentralization. The land was most beautiful, indeed, but not a paradise on earth. Living standards could improve through conquest, but also through expansion, colonization. Either way, each option contributed to an even greater decentralization.

Life, therefore, was not a “test for some happy afterlife” – an idea that the common people of the “Asiatic mode of production” should necessarily entertain. The Greeks were inspired and shaped by Hellenic Nature. They philosophized and discussed public issues under her beneficial influence. She “dictated” to them the forms of their state and political organizations – regardless if they both fomented discord. Their model was the city-state polis;democracy was their ideal; and freedom the highest virtue – regardless if they lived in a slave and “male” society. It seems contradictory… Moreover, their democracy was pure, direct; today’s so-called “democracy” is the so-called “representative” where power is not exercised by the people anymore but by their so-called “representatives”, contrary to the very definition of democracy (see our next additional Voyage). More and more oxymora and paradoxa…

Living in this environment, the Greeks have not only summarized, but also humanized, the ancient world. They have shown us what measure, proportion and harmony are. They have turned knowledge and culture as every free citizen’s right, and not a closed caste’s privilege. And they have left their invaluable heritage systematized and documented for future generations. Just like their gods, however, they have been full of shortcomings, born out of the same environment that has fostered their virtues, with individualism underlying all. They are called les enfants terribles de l’antiquité. Rather, I would say, of human history…

THERE ARE TIMES in these Voyages and Chronicles, as in similar cases when you have to present a thesis and you need documentation, that you know in general terms beforehand what you are looking for while searching for clues. Some other times, however, the clew you have in hand to find your way in the labyrinth of history leads you to unexpected ends, “into harbours seen for the first time”; and then a desire is born to “stop at Phoenicianemporia… / and visit many Egyptian cities / to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars”, as Cavafy advises in his Ithaca. These are the happiest moments of a research. It happened exactly that when from the Aegeanemporia in the historical space of the Mediterranean I ended up following itinerant Minoan artists to distant lands! I felt I needed to set forth more information about these emporia after I had referred to Naucratis in the previous Chronicle, realizing that I already used this term several times in connection with colonies or trading posts; but the emporia were in fact neither colonies nor trading posts, though related to both. Writing in the Encyclopaedia of the Hellenic World on Commercial posts and harbours, Elias Petropoulos tried to clear things out:

The term emporion denoting a colony or a type of settlement first appears in ancient literature rather late, during the 5th century BC. According to some scholars, the emporion should be understood as the locale of the emporos (that is, merchant), i.e. the person who travels to buy and sell commodities. The word emporos etymologically originates from the preposition en and the word poros (which means sea route). This word appears in theOdysseyof Homer twice. In both these cases the epic poet obviously means a private individual who travels for professional reasons. So we could suppose that the word emporion originates from the word emporos. This word does not appear on [Mycenaean] Linear B tablets, and this is rather surprising, but it also leads to the obvious conclusion that this word was coined at a later time. Scholarship on the subject argues that the word or the term emporion (in the sense of a colony or settlement and not that of a simple commercial transaction or exchange of products) appears first in writing in the works of Herodotus in the mid-5th century BC. By the 4th century BC the word is found on an inscription known as ‘the inscription of Pistiros’ which has been unearthed quite recently in a settlement of the modern-day Bulgarian (ancient Thracian) hinterland, close to Philippopolis…

Emporion < Emporos (merchant) < en + poros = one who is on a sea route

According to information coming from Herodotus’ fourth book of theHistories[entitledMelpomene], the Black Sea was home to several emporia, which is the precise word the historian uses to define these settlements… There are also more scattered references to emporia in the other eight books of Herodotus’ work. These are emporia located outside the Black Sea, and are situated in the Mediterranean. Of all these, the case of Naucratis causes puzzlement: the historian refers to it using both the terms emporion and polis(that is, city). Many studies have dealt with this issue, but unfortunately we still cannot determine the early nature of this settlement with certainty. The term usually understood as the opposite of emporion is apoikia (that is, colony), which is considered as a complete form of settlement in the model of the ancient Greek cities, i.e. a settlement featuring a distinct form of political and social organization. A colony was a settlement obviously established in the context of a predetermined plan of action and was carried out under the auspices of a god (or gods) with every formality on the part of the metropolis, possessing an agricultural hinterland and its own coinage… However, in some cases, the emporion may be characterized as a proto-polis or a proto-settlement, in the sense that it can act as the early stage in the establishment of a colony or a city.

Emporia (sing. emporion, or emporium in Latin), according to Wikipedia, were places which the traders of one people had reserved to their business interests within the territory of another people. Famous emporia in Egypt, except Naucratis, included Avaris and Sais, where the Athenian legislator Solon went in 590 BCE to acquire the knowledge of the Egyptians. Similar emporia were founded in the Levant, such as Al-Mina and Posideion in Syria. Sais (Σάϊς, or Zau in ancient Egyptian) was located in the Western NileDelta. The city’s patron goddess was Neith. The Greeks, such as Herodotus, Plato and Diodorus Siculus, identified her with Athena and hence postulated a primordial link to Athens. Diodorus recounts that Athena built Sais before the deluge that supposedly destroyed Athens and Atlantis. While all Hellenic cities were destroyed during that cataclysm, the Egyptian cities survived. In Plato’s Timaeusand Critias(around 395 BCE), a priest in Sais entrusted to Solon the story of Atlantis, its military aggression against Greece and Egypt, and its eventual defeat and destruction by natural catastrophe.(a)

(a) The story of Atlantis is most probably connected with the Sea Peoples’ raids and the consequent Bronze Agecollapse. This should have been the “cataclysm” that destroyed Hellas, while Egypt barely survived… (See mainly Chronicle 5).

Taureador: Fresco fragment from Avaris, 16th BCE

Avaris (Αὔαρις, today’s Tell el-Dab’a), the capital of Egypt under the CanaaniteHyksos, was also located in the Nile delta in the northeastern region. Its position at the hub of Egypt’s emporia made it a major administrative and commercial centre. Excavations have shown that there was a busy harbour catering to over 300 ships during a trading season. Artifacts inside the precinct of the palace, possibly a temple, have produced goods from all over the Aegean world. Most impressively, there were even Minoan-like wall paintings similar to those found in Crete at the Palace of Knossos. It is speculated that there was close contact with the rulers of Avaris, whoever they were, and the large building representing the frescoes allowed the Minoans to have a ritual life in Egypt. French archaeologist Yves Duhoux also proposed the existence of a Minoan colony on an island in the Nile delta.

Minoan Ladies in Blue fresco, ca 1525-1450 BCE

Outside of the Aegean, only three sites have an indisputable record of Minoan civilization, one being Avaris in Lower Egypt, the others Kabri and Alalakh in the Levant. Kabri, in Palestine near the Lebanese border, is notable for its Minoan style wall paintings. In the summer of 2009, more Aegean style frescoes were found at the site. Apparently, the Canaanite rulers of the city wished to associate with Mediterranean culture and not adopt Syrian and Mesopotamian styles of art like other cities in Canaan did. Alalakh was a late Bronze Age city-state in the area where SeleucidAntioch was to be founded at the end of the 4th century BCE. It was occupied from before 2000 BCE, when the first palace was built, and likely destroyed in the 12th century by the Sea Peoples, as were many other towns of coastal Anatolia and the Levant. The city was never reoccupied, the nearby port of Al-Mina taking its place during the Iron Age.

Al-Mina (“The Port” in Arabic) is the name given by archaeologist Leonard Woolley to this ancient trading post in the estuary of the Orontes. According to Woolley, it was an early Hellenic trading colony, founded a little before 800 BCE in direct competition with the Phoenicians to the south. Large amounts of Greek pottery established its early Euboean connections, while the Syrian and Phoenician ware reflected a cultural mix typical of an emporium. The controversy whether Al-Mina is to be regarded as a native Syrian site, with local architecture and pots and a Hellenic presence, or as a Greek trading post, has not been resolved. Al-Mina served as an entrepôt for cultural influences that accompanied trade with Urartu and Assyria through the shortest caravan route. Pottery recovered from later levels after 700 BCE shows that a Hellenic presence endured through the 4th century BCE with pottery imported from Miletus and deftly imitated locally, apparently by Greek potters. Al-Mina is a key to understanding the role of early Hellenes in the East at the outset of the Orientalizing period of Greek cultural history. Robin Lane Fox has made a case for the Hellenic name of the site to have been Potamoi Karon mentioned by Diodorus Siculus; he suggestively linked it to karu (“trading post”) in an Assyrian inscription, which would give “Rivers of Emporia”.

Woolley identified Al-Mina with Herodotus’ and Strabo’s Posideion, but more recent scholarship places the latter at Ras al-Bassit, located 53 kilometres north of Latakia (the Hellenistic Laodicea) on the Mediterranean Sea. Excavations revealed a small settlement back to the late Bronze Age, when it may have functioned as an outpost of Ugarit to the south. Unlike Ugarit, Bassit survived to the passage of the Sea Peoples and into the Iron Age. It had strong links with Phoenicia and Cyprus, and a Greek presence was attested from the 7th century BCE. Posideion expanded and its acropolis was fortified in the Hellenistic period.

One of the two figurines Ram in a Thicket. The excavation at Ur was a joint venture of the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania sharing the booty!

Woolley began work at Al-Mina in 1936, after the excavation at Ur in Mesopotamia, where he discovered Sumerian royal tombs of great wealth. He decided to work by the Mediterranean coast because he was interested in finding ties between the Aegean and the Mesopotamian civilizations, and wished to throw light, as he wrote, “upon the development of Cretan civilization and its connections with the great civilizations of Nearer Asia”. Disappointed in not finding a Bronze Age port at Al-Mina, he soon moved his interests to the earlier, more urbane site of Alalakh, where he worked before and after World War II (1937-39 and 1946-49). It seems, however, that his “view” was anything but “impartial”, for he, too, was “spectacled” wearing “Asiatic myopic glasses”. The clues on the “connections” he was interested in were there, of course; but, having already in mind an elaborate scenario, and possibly a hidden ambition to turn Arthur Evans’ work in Crete upside down, he led himself to erroneous conclusions. If Ur had been his Austerlitz, Alalakh turned out to be his Waterloo! His failure to interpret his findings correctly should be taught in every School of Archaeology and help every equally short-sighted scholar learn his/her lesson.(b)

Lawrence (left) and Woolley at Carchemish

(b) Sir Charles Leonard Woolley (1880-1960) has not been an ordinary archaeologist. Best known for his excavation at Ur, and knighted in 1935 for his contributions to his discipline, he is considered as one of the first “modern” archaeologists. Volunteered by Arthur Evans to run the excavation on a Roman site in Northern England, Woolley began his career there in 1906, later admitting that “I had never studied archaeological methods even from books… and I had not any idea how to make a survey or a ground-plan”. He worked with T. E. Lawrence, the later famous “Lawrence of Arabia”, on the excavation of the Hittite city of Carchemish in 1912-14. His work at Ur that began in 1922 led to the discovery of the royal tombs and inspired Agatha Christie in writing the novel Murder in Mesopotamia. The writer later married his assistant, Max Mallowan. Woolley was one of the first archaeologists to propose that the “great deluge” of the Bible was a local flood after identifying a flood-stratum at Ur of “…400 miles long and 100 miles wide; but for the occupants of the valley that was the whole world”…

Having already in mind an elaborate scenario, and possibly a hidden ambition to turn Arthur Evans’ work in Crete upside down, Woolley led himself to erroneous conclusions. If Ur had been his Austerlitz, Alalakh turned out to be his Waterloo! His failure to interpret his findings correctly should be taught in every School of Archaeology.

The uniqueness and seeming suddenness of the emergence of the Cretan palace system in the Aegean has often been explained by connections with and influences from the older advanced civilizations of the ancient Near East. In Alalakh… Woolley thought to have found what he had looked for: in Yarim-Lim’s palace he recognized “unmistakable connections” with Minoan Crete. Similar building techniques… as well as frescoes “identical in colouring, technique and style” at Alalakh and Knossos led him to the conclusion that “there can be no doubt but that Crete owes the best of its architecture, and its frescoes, to the Asiatic mainland” and that “we are bound to believe that trained experts, members of the Architects’ and Painters’ Guilds, were invited to travel overseas from Asia (possibly from Alalakh) to build and decorate the palaces of the Cretan rulers”.

“There can be no doubt but that Crete owes the best of its architecture, and its frescoes, to Asia… Trained experts, members of the Architects’ and Painters’ Guilds, were invited to travel overseas from Asia to build and decorate the palaces of the Cretan rulers”. (Leonard Woolley)

Charging bull and olive tree, relief in Knossos

Woolley’s main argument for this theory, which has been accepted by eminent scholars[!],(c) was that “Yarim-Lim’s palace antedates by more than a century the Cretan examples in the same style”… However, after a long debate on “Alalakh and Chronology”, Woolley’s date [“between circa 1780 and 1730 BC”] proved to be too high. Yarim-Lim of Alalakh was not – as Woolley had thought – Yarim-Lim I of Yamhad, the contemporary of the great Hammurapi of Babylon, but a younger brother of King Abban of Yamhad who gave Alalakh to him as an appanage principality…(d) The dates recently proposed by different scholars lie between ca. 1650 and 1575 BC. In regard to architecture… the evidence is far from substantiating Woolley’s theory of Near Eastern architects working in Crete… The orthostates of Alalakh are ca. 300 years later than the orthostates of the first phase of the Old Palace at Phaistos… Fragments of wall paintings from Yarim-Lim’s palace show characteristic Minoan motifs which appear contemporary or even earlier in Crete. Moreover, the sense of movement detectable in the wall-painting fragments from Yarim-Lim’s palace is characteristically Minoan and in opposition to Near Eastern tradition.

(d) There were three kings of Yamhad under the name of Yarim-Lim and, of course, far more local rulers having the same name, such as the one in Alalakh. Woolley – more than anyone else – should have known better before he wrote that “Crete owes the best of its architecture, and its frescoes, to the Asiatic mainland”…

Papyrus fresco on Thera

Woolley’s strongest argument for a direct connection between the Alalakh paintings and those in Crete was that they both were executed in true fresco painting on wet lime plaster. But it is exactly this fact which definitely disproves Woolley’s theory of the Near Eastern ancestry of Cretan fresco painting. Until most recently the Alalakh frescos formed the only known example of true fresco painting on the ancient Near East. In Crete, true fresco painting is known at least from ca. 1900 BC on. Thus true fresco painting apparently has been first invented on Crete, probably because it was suitable to the temperament of the Minoan artists. Thus, technique, style and iconography of the fresco fragments from the Yarim-Lim palace at Alalakh indicate that their resemblances to the Cretan wall-paintings worked in the reverse direction as that originally thought by Woolley.

“The sense of movement detectable in the wall-painting fragments is characteristically Minoan and in opposition to Near Eastern tradition… Technique, style and iconography indicate that their resemblances to the Cretan wall-paintings worked in the reverse direction as that thought by Woolley… Kabri and Alalakh do not have only single Minoan motifs foreign to ‘Greater Canaan’ but they show a purely Minoan iconography as well as technique. This can only mean they were executed by travelling Minoan artisans.” (Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier)

There is much evidence that Cretan objects of art were highly valued in the ancient Near East. In the Mari tablets Cretan imports are mentioned… The prestige character of the Cretan objects in the Mari texts is indicated by the fact that two of them were presented by King Zimri-Lim of Mari to other Mesopotamian Kings. As finds of Kamares pottery at Ugarit, Qatna, Byblos and Hazor demonstrate, this outstanding pottery was highly esteemed in the Levant. Thus, at least from the 19th century BC on, Crete within its relations to the Levant was not only the receiver but developed into an equal partner producing works of art for which there was a great demand in the Near East.(e) These Cretan works of art arrived by some kind of exchange or trade in the Levant. But, as Woolley has stated, “one cannot export a palace on board of a ship, nor is the ‘art and Mystery’ of fresco-working a form of merchandise”.(f)Do we therefore have to reconstruct just the reverse scenario as that suggested by Woolley, i.e. Cretan artisans travelling to Alalakh for painting the frescoes there?

(e) I ignore the Levantine contribution to the Minoan civilization and, unfortunately, Niemeier gives no information on the subject. What I do know is how much the Cretans were indebted to, and how much they were benefited by learning from, the Egyptians (see Chronicle 2). I can also imagine how much the Egyptians would have benefited if they were not so stuck-up to let themselves learn from the Cretans…

(f) I used a similar argument to show the necessity of Hellenic presence in Iberia: “What the Phoenician ships could not transport and, therefore, made the Greek presence absolutely necessary in Iberia, was Hellenic culture, art, ideas, architectural models, burial habits, and so on” (see Chronicle 7).

Knossos: the Throne Room with the griffins reconstructed

In “Greater Canaan”… there are two other sites which can contribute to the problem: Qatna and Tel Kabri.(g) Fragments of wall-paintings from the palace at Qatna show [techniques] in the characteristic Aegean manner. Tel Kabri lay on one of the most important trade routes of the ancient Near East, the later so-calledVia Maris [Way of the Philistines]…(h)In the palace of the local ruler… a threshold was plastered and painted with… similar floor-techniques and designs of the Minoan palaces but not from the Ancient Near East… There is evidence that the walls of this room were also covered with painted plaster of which unfortunately only tiny fragments have been preserved. The plaster floor has been painted in true fresco technique… found also in Cretan and Theran fresco painting but not in tempera and fresco secco. The colours in the floor’s painting are… very similar to those of Cretan and of Theran wall-painting… Originally the floor… imitated the slabs of a stone pavement… ln Crete painted plaster floors imitating slab-paved floors are known from [ca 2000 BCE]. Other parts of the Kabri floor were decorated with floral motifs. Among them are chains of stylized linear iris blossoms of a characteristic Minoan type which occurs first in frescoes and vase-painting [in 1700-1500 BCE]. Such kind of decorative mixture is a characteristic feature of Minoan fresco painting… The Kabri floor and also the fresco fragments from Yarim-Lim’s palace at Alalakh do not have only single Minoan motifs foreign to “Greater Canaan” which could be explained as intrusive or incorporated elements arriving by motif transfer, but they show a purely Minoan iconography as well as technique. This can only mean that they were executed by travelling Minoan artisans…

(g) Greater Canaan: “the area between the Amuq plain [where Antioch was later built] to the north and the deserts to the south and to the east for the middle and late Bronze Age… appears to form a largely uniform civilization with regional variations.” (Ruth Amiran).

The excavations at Kabri were directed by Aharon Kempinski and Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier.

(h) The historical name of the road, sadly for the IsraeliJews, was Way of the Philistines because it crossed through the Philistine plain, where the Gaza Strip is. Via Maris was “fished up” out of Vulgate – “via maris”, meaning “by the way of the sea” – without specifying any road (there was no such Roman term denoting a road anywhere). The modern name was adopted so as to expel the Palestinians from their homeland even on archaeological terms…

La Petite Parisienne de Crète…

We have evidence for exchange of information on the equipment of the palaces within the ancient Near East (to which Minoan Crete belonged in a certain sense as a westernmost member). That Cretans actually travelled to the Levantine coast is proved by a tablet from the Mari archives mentioning a Cretan who purchases tin at Ugarit from agents of the Mari palace. A tale in the mythological poetry of Ugarit is of highest interest in our context. In it the goddess Anat is sending the divine messenger over the sea to the god of handicrafts, Kothar wa-Khasis, who is brought from his throne in Kptr (almost unanimously identified as Caphtor = Crete)(i) to build a splendid palace for god Baal and to furnish it with precious works of art. As Arvid Schou Kapelrud has stated, Kothar is “the master-builder and the master-smith as he is found in the Near Eastern courts of this time, a highly skilled specialist”. In Canaanite mythology the god of handicrafts was called from Crete to furnish the palaces of the deities with precious works of art; in reality the rulers of Tel Kabri (Rehov) and Alalakh (and other cities, possibly Qatna) asked the rulers of Crete for sending artisans to decorate their palaces with fresco painting. As has been demonstrated by Carlo Zaccagnini, the sending of specialized workers is well-attested in the framework of the diplomatic relations between the rulers in the ancient Near East, their transfers are inserted into the dynamics and formal apparatus of the practice of gift-exchange.

(i) “KPTR” may be identified with “Caphtor”; but the latter’s equation with Crete is the least probable scenario. Biblical Caphtor may refer to: a) Pelusium in the Nile Delta; b) Cilicia; c) Cyprus; and d) Crete (see Chronicle 5). Egypt is also indicated here because in all references to Kothar, except the above-mentioned poetic tale, his abode is identified as “HKPT”, read perhaps as “Hikaptah”, or “House of the ka (soul) of Ptah”, that is, Memphis. The Hellenes pronounced this Hikaptah as Aegyptos, hence the name of the country in many languages.

Minoan fresco frieze at Avaris reconstructed

After the discoveries in Alalakh and Kabri, the Minoan frescoes in Avaris excavated by Manfred Bietak“instantly created much sensation, since among the scenes depicted on them are spectacular representations of bull leaping so closely identified with Minoan cult and culture”, Wolf-Dietrich and Barbara Niemeier commented in another paper on Minoan Frescoes in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Minoan gold ring depicting bull leaping

“From 1990 on, we suggested that the Kabri and the Alalakh frescoes were painted by travelling Aegean specialists, and [some time later] Bietak and Nanno Marinatos did the same for the Avaris frescoes”. There is a minor problem among archaeologists on the date of these frescoes. Wishing perhaps to please everyone, “Bietak and Marinatos came to the conclusion that ‘Minoan wall painting existed in Avaris both during the late Hyksos period and the early 18th [Thutmosid] Dynasty’. Bietak himself had regarded as possible that ‘trade… links between Avaris and Crete… might have survived a dynastic change and might have carried on into the 18th Dynasty, even after the fall of the Hyksos.’ There is indeed enough evidence from history that the kind of diplomatic and economic relations which apparently are behind these fresco paintings can survive the changes of regimes. According to Bietak, ‘king Ahmose, the founder of the 18th Dynasty, fits particularly well into the picture of Minoan connections.’ He imagines the possibility of a political deal between Ahmose and the ‘Minoan Thalassocracy’ in which the Minoan fleet helped Ahmose – who had no fleet – against the danger still threatening from the Hyksos harbour bases in southern Palestine. There is no archaeological or textual evidence for the latter hypothesis, and it recalls rather imaginative and today forgotten scenarios connected with the expulsion of the Hyksos, like those according to which Mycenaean mercenaries helped Ahmose in evicting the Hyksos, or according to which fugitive Hyksos princes conquered the Argolid and subsequently were buried in the Shaft Graves at Mycenae. Moreover, Ahmose already had a fleet: he captured Avaris after a series of assaults by both land and water [and then] proceeded to southern Palestine.”

Ahmose fighting back the Hyksos

Even a pharaoh with a fleet of his own would surely prefer to have the far more experienced Cretan navy by his side than against him allied with the Hyksos! The Avaris paintings indicate an involvement of Egypt in international relations and cultural exchanges with the eastern Mediterranean either through exchange of gifts or even marriage. They additionally point to Minoan authority as being involved in Egyptian affairs possibly because Crete had a strong naval force to offer the pharaoh, and also to Avaris as a place where these cultural exchanges took place, meaning the city was incredibly important to Egypt.

The marriage of a Minoan princess to an Egyptian pharaoh may be one possible scenario. Bietak has suggested that the Avaris frescoes were painted by Minoan artists belonging to the entourage of a Knossian princess married to the pharaoh, whom he first identified as a Hyksos ruler, then as Ahmose, and much later as Thutmose III. Indeed, who was the Cretan girl’s groom? The Thera eruption around 1600 BCE happened in the middle of the Hyksos period (1650–1550). Thus, most probably a royal wedding in the final years of the Hyksos in Egypt must be ruled out. There follows Ahmose with his New Kingdom, when the Egyptians considered the Aegean to be part of their “empire”. The term must not be understood literally, for in the land of the Nile they misinterpreted even the gifts given to the pharaohs: “The Egyptians, with their characteristic egocentric sense of superiority, would have presented such gifts as tribute” (A. R. Schulman). At any rate, “Ahmose fits particularly well into the picture of Minoan connections”. Thutmose could well be the groom, as well. Besides, we know that he had three foreign wives: Menwi, Merti, and Menhet. However, there was a problem: one more dynastic change that took place during his reign, in the middle of the 15th century BCE, not in Egypt but in Crete, when the Minoans were put under the yoke of their own “Hyksos” (foreign rulers), the Mycenaeans. Therefore, if there was a wedding, it should have happened in the beginning of Thutmose’s reign, when the real pharaoh was his stepmother, Hatshepsut.

Theran rosettes

Whatever the motives, these unique wall paintings are of Minoan style, technique, and content. There is a long frieze of bull-leaping and grappling against a maze pattern. Marinatos has made the case that the rosette motif, a prominent feature of the Taureador paintings, reproduces the Knossian rosettes and that it is a distinct Minoan symbol. The frescoes also depict griffins, hunting scenes, felines chasing ungulates, several life-sized figures, and a white female wearing a skirt. Especially important are the emblems of the Minoan palace such as the half rosette frieze and the presence of big griffins which are the same size as the ones in the throne room at Knossos. The technique of the paintings is typically Aegean, while the style is very high quality and compares with some of the best paintings from Crete. According to Bietak, the use of specific Minoan royal motifs in a palace of Avaris indicates “an encounter on the highest level must have taken place between the courts of Knossos and Egypt,” while the large representation of the female in the skirt might suggest a political marriage between the pharaoh and a Minoan princess.

“Dynastic intermarriage was a favoured diplomatic tactic in the Bronze Age Near East,” the Niemeiers point out. The entourage of a foreign princess, some scholars estimate, “would comprise several hundred people, who until the end of their lives remained in the harem of the pharaoh, and that one can well imagine that at Avaris the rooms of the foreign princess and her entourage were decorated according to her desires. [However], at Alalakh and Tel Kabri, the frescoes probably had been attached to the walls of major ceremonial (and possible ritual) halls of the palace, not of the private rooms of queens or princesses.”

Wild duck on Thera

The technique of using lime plaster in two layers with a highly polished surface, fresco in combination with stucco, all are techniques that are not Egyptian but are first seen in Minoan paintings. Also, the colours used by the artists are clearly Minoan. Using blue instead of grey e.g. is Minoan, with that colour convention being seen in Egypt later, and due to Aegean influences. Besides, there are no Egyptian hieroglyphs or emblems among any of the fragments discovered. The composition of the paintings and motifs also fit in perfectly with those of the Aegean world. Thus the overwhelming evidence seems to point in the direction of Minoan artists having been at work in Avaris.

“The differences between the styles of Egyptian and Minoan arts have been analyzed by Henriette Antonia Groenewegen-Frankfort and, most recently, by Bietak,” the Niemeiers remark. “According to Groenwegen-Frankfort, Minoan art differs from Egyptian (and ancient Near Eastern) art in its ‘absolute mobility in organic forms’. Bietak aptly explains this with the different cultural patterns of both civilizations. The Minoan society was not – as the Egyptian one – dominated by writing, listing, and absolute order, and therefore Minoan art was not subjected to hieroglyphic clichés and a rigid canonical order. As to a comparison of Canaanite and Minoan arts, we unfortunately do not have many objects of art from the middle Bronze Age Levant. But those which are extant show a style distinctly different from the Minoan one. For instance, the bird representations on bone inlays from Megiddo and Lachish seem motionless in comparison to the crane on an ivory plaque from Palaikastro. Canaanite female and male metal figurines appear stiff in comparison to the Minoan female and male metal figurines displaying strong inner tension and dynamics.”

“Minoan art differs from Egyptian (and ancient Near Eastern) art in its ‘absolute mobility in organic forms’.” (H.A. Groenewegen-Frankfort)
“The Minoan society was not – as the Egyptian one – dominated by writing, listing, and absolute order, and therefore Minoan art was not subjected to hieroglyphic clichés and a rigid canonical order.” (M. Bietak)

The Fertile Crescent (that also includes the Nile valley and delta): the cradle of civilization in the time of the Bronze Age collapse
(arrows pinpoint all the places mentioned in this Chronicle)

As it turned out the wall paintings in Avaris, Alalakh, Kabri, possibly Qatna (17th-16th centuries BCE), were not the older ones.

“Earlier are the painted stone imitations in Zimri-Lim’s palace at Mari [18th century BCE]. The excavator of Mari, André Parrot, compared the stone imitations to those at Knossos. He also asked for possible connections between the Mari and the Knossos murals, and, pointing to the evidence for their connections provided by the Minoan precious objects mentioned in the Mari archives, he apparently tended to see some Cretan influence in the murals there.”

Located in Mesopotamia, far from the sea, Mari (modern Tell Hariri) was a Sumerian and Amorite city on the Euphrates. It flourished from 2900 until 1759 BCE, when it was sacked by Hammurabi, despite the gifts the king Zimri-Lim had given him. More important was Mari’s strategic position as a relay point between lower Mesopotamia and northern Syria. The city came to control the trade lanes between different regions such as Iran, Mesopotamia, and Anatolia. The royal palace contained over 300 rooms and was possibly the largest of its time. More than 25,000 tablets were recovered there “bringing about a complete revision of the historical dating of the ancient Near East and providing more than 500 new place names, enough to redraw the geographical map of the ancient world,” as Parrot noted. Qatna (modern Tell el-Mishrife), 18 km northeast of Homs, was also one of the largest Bronze Age towns in Syria. In the 2nd Millennium trade routes developed connecting Mesopotamia with Cyprus, Crete and Egypt. Qatna is mentioned in the tin trade, which went from Mari via Qatna to the Mediterranean; Cypriote copper was transported in the other direction; their alloy, bronze, was most valuable especially during the Bronze Age.

Theran boy-boxers

As for the ethnic composition of the “Minoan” workshops, there are various possibilities: the frescoes were painted a) by travelling Aegean artisans; b) under the supervision of Aegean artists with the assistance of Levantine painters trained by them; c) by Levantine pupils of Aegean masters. The idea of mixed workshops seems more appealing, probable and realistic. Decorating huge palaces was a great undertaking. However, it would seem unthinkable to imagine Cretan ships full of artists travelling around the Mediterranean for this task. The artistic teams should have been rather small necessarily working with local apprentices.

“It is difficult to decide in each case which of these solutions is the correct one,” according to the Niemeiers. “We would agree with Philip P. Betancourt that only a very small percentage of the fresco paintings is known and that ‘we are touching the tip of the iceberg of a whole series of interrelated workshops, working in Knossos, the Aegean islands, on the coast of Western Asia and in Egypt, perhaps travelling back and forth, perhaps occasionally exchanging personnel or going back to Knossos to learn the most recent things’… The Alalakh, Tel Kabri, and Avaris frescoes are to be seen ‘in terms of the forging of an élite koiné [common ‘idiom’] – artistic, iconographical, ideological, technological – in the circumstances of the intense maritime interaction between the coastal Areas of the Eastern Mediterranean’,” as S. Sherratt proposed. Marinatos has also argued that these paintings are evidence of a koiné, a visual language of common symbols, which testifies to interactions among the rulers of neighbouring powers. “The Minoan artists involved in the painting of all these frescoes”, the Niemeiers agree, “apparently formed an important element in the growth of the so-called ‘International Style’ of the Late Bronze Age eastern Mediterranean.”

And not only of the eastern part of mare nostrum, I would add: according to some fresco experts, similar Minoan-style wall paintings have also been found in Morocco…

There was “a whole series of interrelated workshops, working in Knossos, the Aegean islands, on the coast of Western Asia and in Egypt, perhaps travelling back and forth, perhaps occasionally exchanging personnel or going back to Knossos to learn the most recent things.” (P.P. Betancourt)
The frescoes are to be seen “in terms of the forging of an élite koiné – artistic, iconographical, ideological, technological – in the circumstances of the intense maritime interaction between the coastal areas of the eastern Mediterranean.” (S. Sherratt)

Cretans in Egypt, bringing gifts of metal, jewelry etc, facsimile of a painting in Thebes, 18th dynasty,
early 15th century BCE

Whatever happened to the Avaris wall paintings? One group of them had fallen off the wall of a doorway, and the other group of fragments was found in dumps deposited by the north-east palace. The frescoes seem to have been removed during the later Thutmosid period – when there was no Minoan Crete anymore.

“Minoan fresco painting apparently was a rather short-lived phenomenon in the Levant and Egypt – in Egyptian terms, covering the Hyksos period and the very beginning of the early 18th Dynasty,” the Niemeiers sum up. “Later, we find again paintings of nature scenes which appear to breathe a Minoan spirit. They were, however, executed in secco technique and certainly were not painted by Aegean artists. Minoan wall painting was a thing of the past at that time.”

Without Minoan Crete there was no room for Minoan art. The Minoan workshops were still busy, of course; but the artistic masters worked for the new political masters, the Mycenaeans; there were no Greek artists at that time to compete with them. However, their new works of art are not typified as “Minoan” anymore; they are called “Mycenaean”, sometimes accompanied with a footnote that they were made by Cretan artistic workshops. Would anyone ever think to describe as “Cretan” the masterpieces of another great Cretan master who lived more than three millennia later, namely Doménicos Theotocópoulos, the famous El Greco?

Mycenaean women procession fresco

Here we are again at our starting point, having completed the circle that began with Periplus and Minoan thalassocracy and ended with Emporia and Minoan painting. Now we can start anew, going back even before our starting point – before man learned how to work metals, when voyages were made in search of an equally valuable material: the obsidian. Let us go back to the Neolithic era! Let’s try at least…

Such ‘tangible’, “convincing evidence” in the archaeologists’ hands, i.e. a number of Egyptian trade items found in Spain, is of “a somewhat later period”, after the fall of the Minoans, ca 1400-1200 BCE. Although the possibility of “Phoenician intermediaries” cannot be ruled out, one needs to have in mind that exactly in this “somewhat later period” (late Bronze Age), especially in the western Mediterranean, sea trade was in the hands of those who brought about the fall of the Minoans, that is, the Mycenaeans – who, strangely enough, are not even mentioned by the American professor! Therefore, his assertion that the Egyptian trade items found in Spain “almost surely may be associated with Phoenician intermediaries” is anything but scientific.

Besides, the Aegean presence in Egypt, the country of origin of these trade items, dates back to at least Mycenaean times and more likely even further back into the Minoan age, when a trade settlement was founded in the Nile Delta under the aegis of the Pharaohs, namely Naucratis (Ναύκρατις). It was the first and, for much of its early history, the only permanent Hellenic colony in Egypt, acting as a symbiotic nexus for the interchange of Egyptian and Greek trade items, art and culture.(b) When a historian “forgets” the Mycenaeans and Naucratis, it means he wears “Phoenician myopic glasses”! Under the circumstances, Stanislawski, an expert on Portugal, cannot be suspected of pro-Hellenic bias in his narrative about the same fateful events in Iberia related in the previous Chronicles 6, 7, and 8. At the same time, we can test the accuracy of our own testimony:

(b) Naucratis, which was located in the Nile Delta, on its westernmost branch, 70 kilometers southeast of its mouth, where Alexandria was later to be built, was not only the first Greek settlement in Egypt but also Egypt’s most important harbour in antiquity until the rise of Alexander’s city. Its first period is obscure because of the collapse of Mycenaean civilization and the ensuing “Dark ages” (1100-750 BCE). A Hellenic cultural “renaissance” in the 7th century brought about renewed contacts with the East and its two great river civilizations of the Nile and Mesopotamia. According to Herodotus the shrine known as the Hellenion was a co-operative enterprise financed by nine Greek city-states: four Ionian (Chios, Clazomenae, Teos and Phocaea), four Dorian (Rhodes, Halicarnassus, Knidos and Phaselis), and one Aeolian (Mytilene). Miletus, Samos and Aegina had their own separate sanctuaries. Thus the natives of at least twelve Hellenic cities worked in a collaboration that was not only rare but proved to be lasting.

The sister port of Naucratis was the harbour town of Heracleion or Thonis, Egypt’s main seaport to Greece, which was only discovered in 2000 by the French underwater archaeologist Franck Goddio. Its ruins are located 2.5 kilometers off the modern coast. The city was built on some adjoining islands connected with bridges and intersected by canals. It submerged into the sea in the 6th or 7th century CE, probably due to major earthquakes and floods. The “Stele of Naukratis” with a Pharaonic decree on it, describes Heracleion as a “harbour in the Sea of Hellenes”, referring to the Mediterranean. Its twin “Stele of Heracleion” was recovered in 2000. The city’s Greek name is linked to a large temple of Khonsu, whom the Greeks identified with Heracles. The city is believed to have been visited by the great hero, as well as Paris and Helen on their flight from the jealous Menelaus, before the Trojan war. Heracleion’s mythic wealth was lauded by Homer, as well.

An offspring of Naucratis was Athenaeus, a Hellene rhetorician, grammarian, and gastronomist, flourishing in the late 2nd – early 3rd centuries CE. His books have been lost, except a 15-volume synopsis of his 30-volume Deipnosophistae (Banquet Connoisseurs), which mostly survives. It is an immense store-house of information, on matters linked to dining, music, songs and dances, games, courtesans, and luxury. Guests included wealthy persons, patrons of art, and scholars, jurists, musicians, and others, who described the lifestyle, the arts and scientific knowledge of the Greeks. In the course of discussing classic authors, they made quotations from nearly 800 writers and 2,500 works, many of them unrecorded. Thus we are entrusted much valuable information about the ancient world and many authors that would be otherwise unknown.

An Athenaeus’ contemporary, a bit older, was Julius Pollux (Ἰούλιος Πολυδεύκης), also born in Naucratis, flourishing in the late 2nd century CE and living a long life of more than 80 years. He was a grammarian and sophist, scholar and rhetorician, whom Commodus appointed a professor-chair of rhetoric in the AthenianAcademy – due to his melodious voice, according to Lives of the Sophists by Philostratus. Nothing of his rhetorical works has survived. His valuable extant work is Onomasticon (Ὀνομαστικόν), a thesaurus or dictionary of Attic synonyms and phrases in ten books, arranged not alphabetically but according to subject-matter. It supplies in passing much rare information on many points of classical antiquity – objects in daily life, the theatre, music, politics – and quotes numerous fragments of lost works. Thus, Pollux became invaluable for William Smith‘s Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1842), etc.

Other personages linked with Naucratis were the Naucratis Painter, a vase-painter of the 6th century BCE, and also Rhodopis, a celebrated Thracianhetaera who lived in the same period. Herodotus says she was a fellow-slave of the fable teller Aesop, with whom she had a secret love affair. Charaxus, brother of Sappho, who had gone to Naucratis as a merchant, fell in love with her, and ransomed her from slavery with a large sum of money. Sappho wrote a poem accusing Rhodopis of robbing her brother of his property but, nevertheless, the hetaera became the model for the original version of the Cinderellastory recorded later by Strabo.

Celts in Europe

A WESTWARD MOVEMENT

Celtic art in Spain

The earliest passage of Phoenician ships through the Straits of Gibraltar was probably made during the general period of time when the Central European farmers and pastoralists were first entering the Cantabrian region. These events preceded the 1st millennium BC. Later, Greek exploration and trade grew, following the example given by neighboring Phoenicia, perhaps as early as the 9th century and certainly by the end of the 7th century BC. Such contacts can be equated in time with the acceleration of the East-West movement of peoples and cultures which took place in the North with the advent of the Celts, who may have appeared in Iberia as early as 900 BC, and the main force of which was felt by the 6th century. Between the 6th and the 3rd centuries BC, while the lands of the western Mediterranean were developing under the influence of active and aggressive Greeks and Carthaginians, northern Iberia was changing under the influence of Celts of later arrival from beyond the Pyrenees. There was a difference, however, between the early contacts along the Mediterranean coasts and those of the Central Europeans with northern Iberia. It was not opportunity for settlement that drew men along the southern coasts, but trade… It was the attraction of metals that drew the early Greeks beyond the straits of Gibraltar and along the western coasts of Spain.

CONTACTS WITH THE WEST COAST OF IBERIA

It is possible that the early merchant wayfarers sailed up the west coast to trade directly with Galicia. But if they did, the coast of present Portugal represented a gap in their interest, for there is almost no record of them there.(c) It would seem that Portugal was then, as through so many periods of time before and after, apart from the main stream of events. It possessed no great source of silver such as the mines of Andalusia, nor of copper or tin (with slight exceptions in both cases).(d) With her metals, Spain was a magnet for the early traders, whereas Portugal attracted casual traders at most…

Egyptian scarabs

(c) There are slight exceptions; e.g., there is the Egyptian scarab of the 7th century BC that was found in a pre-Celtic level at Alcácer do Sal. (DS)

(d) There is no record e.g. of Carthaginian exploitation of the copper of the Alentejo, which Romans later mined at Aljustrel. As all of southern Portugal is poor in tin, silver, and gold, there was little there to distract them from their preoccupation with such places as Andalusia and Murcia. (DS)

HOMOGENEITY OF THE IBERIAN MEDITERRANEAN REGION

At the time of their first contacts with the west, the earliest Phoenicians and Greeks encountered a culture area with fundamentally similar characteristics throughout. It extended along the Mediterranean coasts, slopes, and adjacent interior valleys, from the Pyrenees to the Guadiana River… With their usual perspicacity, the Greeks recognized this area as being essentially homogeneous and sharply different in culture from the Celtic territories of the interior and of the north and west peripheries…

Indisputably, one of the important Iberian groups was that of the Tartessians, wealthy farmers and traders in metals. It was their knowledge of the sources of metals that first brought them in touch with the Phoenicians and Greeks. They knew the coasts to the west and northwest of their home, for the tin and gold that they traded came from Galicia. They were also able to furnish silver, copper, and lead, which came to them from the Guadalquivir River basin. It appears that tin was the product of greatest importance at the time. The early centuries of the pre-Christian millennium were times of great opulence along the coast of Galicia. That this wealth was due to tin may be inferred from the fact that the Greeks used the termCassiteridesto identify the area. However, the question as to the ultimate source of tin is moot. In spite of the lack of archaeological evidence it seems likely that, in the earliest years of trading, it came from alluvial deposits along the river banks of Galicia. There is a possibility, however, that Bronze Age connections with French Brittany and with the British Isles had continued and that the Galicians were merely purveyors of tin from those places. This basic necessity of bronze-users was scarce in the other parts of the Phoenician and Greek world. There was no tin in all of North Africa, Asia Minor, Caucasia, Cyprus, mainland Greece, and the Greek islands. The mines of Tuscany were small. It is no wonder that both Galicia and the Tartessians were prosperous and that the Phoenicians and Greeks were attracted to the area.

“Tin was the product of greatest importance at the time. This basic necessity of bronze-users was scarce in the other parts of the Phoenician and Greek world.” (Dan Stanislawski)

GREEK EXPLORATION AND SETTLEMENT

Hellenic ship, mocaic, ca 1st century BCE-CE

The earliest Greek ventures may perhaps be dated as of the 9th or the 8th century BC. Possibly Rhodian and Chalcidian sailors were in the western Mediterranean at this time… The line of Ionian names stretching along the islands and coasts of the western Mediterranean and to the Atlantic coast of Portugal – the names with the -oussa termination – can probably be ascribed to this early period. These names are important in dating the arrival of the Greeks in western waters. They mark the island route of the early Greek navigators. Starting from Syrakoussai [Syracuse] in eastern Sicily, they may be followed through Ichnoussa (Sardinia), Meloussa (Menorca), Rornyoussa (Mallorca) and Pityoussa (Ibiza). The latter three, even now, are identified on maps as the Balearics or Pityusas.(e) The -oussa names extend westward to the straits of Gibraltar and up the Atlantic coast of Portugal to Ophioussa, in the region of Lisbon, and the general area of Portugal plus Galicia may have been vaguely termed Ophioussa.

The “Balearides” (Gymnesian) and the “Pityusae” Isles on an old map

(e) The Balearics comprise two island groups: the Gymnesians (Majorca and Minorca), and the Pityuses (Eivissa or Ibiza and Formentera). The term “Balearic” derives from the Greek Βαλλιαρεῖς or Βαλεαρεῖς (Baleares in Latin, from βάλλω, meaning “to launch”), referring to the islanders who were skilled slingers and served as mercenaries for the Hellenes, Punics, and Romans. However, Strabo regarded the word as of Phoenician origin, as the equivalent for lightly armoured soldiers the Greeks called γυμνῆτας, hence Γυμνησίαι (from γυμνός, meaning naked). This does not mean they fought naked, but that they used much lighter armament than the hoplites. Nevertheless, according to Lycophron‘s Alexandra, the toponym refers to some shipwrecked Boeotians who were cast nude on the islands (a story evidently invented to account for the name); or to the islanders themselves who were often nude (probably because of the year-round benevolent climate). In the Gymnesian Islands there are megalithic stone monuments (naveta, taula and talaiot) which speak of a very early prehistoric human activity. They are similar, but not necessarily related, to the nuraghe of Sardinia, and the torri of Corsica. One of the earliest cultures on Minorca was influenced by other Mediterranean civilizations, including the Minoan. Those islanders e.g. may have imitated the inverted plastered timber columns found at Knossos (such evidence is probably not “convincing” enough for Stanislawski).There is also a tradition that the Balearics were colonized by Rhodes after the Trojan War. The Pityusic Islands (from the Greek πιτύα, pine tree) are sometimes informally called in English as the Pine Islands, which is identical to the ancient Hellenic name Πιτυοῦσσαι, “pine-covered islands”. In antiquity they were listed in Claudius Ptolemy‘s Geography under the names Ophiusis and Ebyssus, which had a town of the same name. It is the port Ibossim founded by the Phoenicians in 654 BCE, later known to Romans as Ebusus, hence Eivissa (in Catalan) or Ibiza (in Spanish). (ML)

Herodotus said that it was Greeks from the city of Phocaea in Asia Minor who were first to navigate in the western Mediterranean waters. It may seem temerous to question the facts of the father of history, but Antonio García does so convincingly.(f) The Phocaeans, says he, arrived late upon the scene, profiting by earlier maritime contacts. Nor does he accept the statement that the important voyage of Colaeus, the Samian, was a voyage of discovery of Tartessos for the Greeks. This widely heralded 7th century journey was, to him, merely one – although perhaps the most profitable and spectacular up to that time – of many such voyages that had been made by Rhodians, Chalcidians, Samians, and others.(g)

(g) Another point of view is expressed by H. R. W. Smith in his review of García’s Hispania Graeca. Smith does not deny the thesis of García but says that he can find no reason to believe that the Phocaeans reached Tartessos prior to the time of Arganthonios, the Tartessian king friendly to the Greeks, or before the voyage of Colaeus. (DS)

Following the Mediterranean island route, the Phocaeans arrived from Asia Minor to Iberia.

Whatever the dating may be – and the archaeological inquiry has far to go – the Phocaeans certainly became the most active and effective Greeks in the area. Their colonization had energy and breadth and was the only one in the western Mediterranean with lasting results… There is no specific evidence that this activity was connected with the decay of Tyre, but there is such a coincidence in time. Tyrian decline had begun by the end of the 8th century BC and was notable during the following century. This was the time of the voyage of Colaeus the Samian (650 BC), the founding of the Phocaean colony of Massalia, present Marseille (600 BC, or approximately then), and the founding of Alalia in Corsica (640 BC, or approximately 40 years prior to Massalia). Some time before the end of the century, Mainake, the most westerly of Phocaean colonies, was founded near Málaga.(h)

(h) Within 20 miles to the east, says García; Smith suggests that it might even be at approximately the outskirts of present Málaga. (DS)

Some dates are different here. The difference in Colaeus’ voyage is not important (650, not ca 640 BCE); but the dating of the founding of Alalia is almost one century earlier (650 instead of 566 BCE). Perhaps, as in other similar cases, the older date denotes the creation of a temporary settlement before the founding of a city. (ML)

This century was one of intimacy between Phocaeans and Tartessians. The reign of Arganthonios of Tartessos began in the 7th century BC. The ancient sources spoke of his 80-year reign but probably, in typical Greek fashion, they dramatized a dynasty or a period by creating a mythical longevity for a single ruler. Whether this represented one ruler or several does not alter the fact that there was frequent and close contact between Tartessos and Phocaea. This was the period of the Phocaean maritime dominance during which the Tartessian king lent money to the Phocaeans to build their fortifications against the threat of the Persians.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN GREEKS AND PUNIC PEOPLES
IN THEIR RELATIONS WITH IBERIA

The island and bay of Gadir: the Phoenicians’ springboard for attacks against Tartessos

The period of the decline of Tyre was not only important for the Ionian Greeks, but also for the Tyrian colony of Carthage. During the time of Phocaean colonization, Carthage too was expanding. As early as 653 BC it had established the colony on Ibiza of the Balearics, which lay athwart the Greek island route to the west. After 573 BC, when Tyre fell to the Babylonians, Carthage showed increasing independence. Competition for western metals was growing between the two great rivals, Carthage and Greece. It is reasonable to assume that the friendship of Arganthonios (or that of his dynasty), throughalmost a century of time, was more than mere affection and amiability. It probably represented a form of alliance in which the Tartessians aided the Phocaeans in their struggle against the threat to their mother city. In return, Greeks supported the Westerners against the growing aggressiveness of Carthage and the Punic colony of Gadir, which threatened the area of Tartessos. Almost from the time of their founding of Gadir the Phoenicians showed their expansionist tendencies. It was not long before they were using the island as a base of attack against the mainland and the Tartessians.

“The [Greco-Tartessian] friendship represented a form of alliance… against the growing aggressiveness of Carthage and Gadir, which threatened the area of Tartessos. Almost from the time of their founding of Gadir the Phoenicians showed their expansionist tendencies. It was not long before they were using the island as a base of attack against the Tartessians.”
(Dan Stanislawski)

Greek Massaliotes in Iberia

The Greeks were usually neither pacific nor friendly neighbors when the prospect of gain was apparent. In this they differed little from the Phoenicians. However, in their relations with the Tartessians they had no desire, it would seem, for control of land or people, but merely wanted to trade their products, especially olive oil and wine, for Tartessian metals.(i) In fact, the history of Greek contacts with Iberians is one of amity, and the hospitality of the Iberians toward Greeks was proverbial. The purposes of both peoples were served by friendly intercourse and mutual support against the common enemy, especially after the increased importance and the expanded ambition of Carthage. A major clash for complete dominance of the area was inevitable. This was speeded by events in the eastern Mediterranean area…

“The history of Greek contacts with Iberians is one of amity, and the hospitality of the Iberians toward Greeks was proverbial. The purposes of both peoples were served by friendly intercourse and mutual support against the common enemy, especially after the increased importance and the expanded ambition of Carthage. A major clash for complete dominance of the area was inevitable.” (Dan Stanislawski)

(i) Pierson Dixon, The Iberians of Spain, and Rhys Carpenter, The Greeks in Spain, state that the olive tree and the vine were introduced into Spain by the Greeks. Olive oil was exported from Greek Akragas to Carthage in the first half of the 1st millennium BC. No doubt the Greeks traded in wine with Iberia. Wine made from grapes is very old in the countries of the eastern Mediterranean, and the Phoenicians were famous merchants of wine… (DS)

Why then Carthage bought wine from the Hellenes and not from the Phoenicians, their kindred? Probably because Akragas was very close; for the Punic traders profit was more important than kinship. Or because, as usual, the Phoenician wine could not stand a comparison with the Greek wine… (ML)

THE ALALIA COLONY AND ITS EFFECTS

Phocaean electrum coin with playing seals

In this part of his narrative, Dan Stanislawski turns his attention to the historic developments in Asia Minor: in 546 BCE Cyrus captured Lydia, causing “a mass migration of perhaps half of the population of Phocaea to their Corsican colony of Alalia”. When the Persians took Phocaea, “all the men in this city of probably 5,000 to 7,000 people had gone. This population figure suggests the large number of available vessels, and points to the commercial importance of the city at that time”. There follows the Battle of Alalia“sometime between 540 and 535 BC” with its disastrous results for the Hellenes and also the Tartessians.

Carthage may then have sealed the straits of Gibraltar, as Carpenter suggests. More likely, the straits had been largely sealed for a long time, but after the battle the land route between Mainake and Tartessos was also blocked. Mainake itself was destroyed by the Carthaginians toward the end of the century, to end its traffic and its competition with the Carthaginian settlement in the location of present Málaga…

As Carthage had inherited the western empire of Tyre, so did Massalia fall heir to that of her mother city, Phocaea. Greek trade became centered here, with the end of Phocaean maritime enterprise in the West of the Mediterranean. Trade through France to Brittany and beyond had been undoubtedly important to the Massaliotes previous to this time, but the record had been obscured by the greater drama of the struggle on the Mediterranean. During the last half of the 6th century BC, during which time Carthaginians grasped complete power in the West, the prosperity of Galicia – presumably based upon tin – declined. This decline may have been due to the change from the sea route, by way of the Straits, to that from Massalia, via the French rivers, to the northwest and ultimately to Britain…

“Galicia’s decline may have been due to the change from the sea route, by way of the Straits, to that from Massalia, via the French rivers, to Britain. The direct land route from Massalia skirted the Carthaginian barrier and eliminated Galician middlemen.” (Dan Stanislawski)

Stanislawski offers four possible explanations for the Galician decline; the second one is probably the most important:

More likely, the Galicians had for some time been not producers, but purveyors, of tin from French Armorica or the British Isles. If this were true, the direct land route from Massalia would have skirted the Carthaginian barrier and eliminated Galician middlemen… At approximately the same period of time there was an increased interest in silver… by the avidity with which the Greeks of Asia Minor sought it for coinage… Perhaps the richest of ancient silver mines was that of Mastia (or Massia), a region second only to Tartessos in commercial importance. The ancient prosperity of the region and of its most important city, also named Mastia (or Massia), the later Cartago Nova, and probably the site of the present Cartagena, was based upon silver mining through several centuries. Great amounts were mined under the direction of Hannibal in the 3rd century BC, and it was still a large operation at the time of Polybius in the succeeding century.

CARTHAGINIAN DOMINATION OF THE WESTERN MEDITERRANEAN

The Celts (the only Indo-Europeans in Iberia) lived mainly in Galicia, the Celtiberians in Portugal and half of Spain, the Iberians in the other half (Andalusia to Catalonia),
the Basques in NE Spain and SW France

[After the battle of Alalia] Greek commercial activity in Iberia was ended and Carthage was less inhibited in the spread of its control. Tartessos, which had feared the Carthaginians and had allied itself with the Greeks, was left without support and was destroyed.(j) In the following century, probably 20,000 Iberian mercenaries were fighting in Sicily for the Carthaginians… Celts were also serving as mercenaries in the Carthaginian forces.

(j) If there was no one city of that name, it is not important to the larger fact that the area as a whole was put under the control of the Carthaginians of Gadir (Carpenter, The Greeks in Spain). (DS)

There was an increasing reliance upon mercenaries from the peninsula, not only from the fringes but from deep within the interior as well. In the late 3rd century BC, Hannibal’s army included Celtiberians from the northern interior, Galicians from the extreme northwest, Lusitanians from Middle Portugal, Vettones from the middle Tagus drainage – and these do not complete the list. Such troops, however, were something other than pure mercenaries; many had been forcibly impressed into service… During earlier centuries no general antagonism in Iberia seems to have been engendered by the Carthaginians. Locally there may have been antagonism, such as probably existed between the Carthaginians and the Tartessians, but for the tribes of the interior the Carthaginians may have had a friendly appeal. They offered an opportunity to fight with pay. It was later, when the Carthaginians had expanded their power and increased their need for troops that their tactics changed with regard to these tribes of the interior, which had long served as a source of manpower. When Hannibal, in desperate need for troops and under economic pressure, forcibly impressed some of them into his armies, the others reacted in bitter opposition. The tribes of the interior were a bellicose lot. An opportunity to fight for pay was not distasteful to them but a demand that they submit to enslavement was another matter. According to Strabo they resisted Hannibal as they later did the Romans for somewhat the same reasons.

Nevertheless, tens of thousands of mercenaries were introduced to new lands and cultures of the middle and eastern Mediterranean. Since this process had been going on from as early as the 6th century BC and many men had returned to the peninsula, the effect upon attitudes of the peoples of the Meseta[‘Plateau’, in the heart of Iberia] and even some of the remote western coasts may have been considerable.

The harbour of Carthage

Dan Stanislawski’s impartial view of Iberia is almost identical with the historical panorama of the last three Chronicles: Ὅπερἔδειδεῖξαι, as Euclid would say, or quod erat demonstrandum (Q.E.D), or ‘what had to be demonstrated’! There is still one Periplus left, dropping anchor at several emporiain the Mediterranean, to come full circle back to our starting point – a voyage full of surprises with several itinerant artisans, artists, and masters we meet on the way, “members of the Architects’ and Painters’ Guilds”, whose Linear A writing, however, puzzles the famous archaeologist Leonard Woolley…

“It is not only a seductive idea but it makes a reasonable hypothesis, for the Minoans were good navigators, traders, and seekers of metals. Had they known anything of the Iberian Peninsula they might well have been attracted; however, while it is quite possible that the Mediterranean island route to the west was used by them (Rhys Carpenter, The Greeks in Spain), as yet there is no convincing evidence that it was. The excavations of Almerían culture at Los Millares, which may be dated as of 2000-1800 BC, presented certain items reminiscent of Aegean cultures, but there is no evidence that would clearly demonstrate connection. Such items may represent nothing more than casual parallelism. Other finds of a somewhat later period in Spain make better evidence of contact with the eastern Mediterranean lands, for they can be neatly equated with materials of Egyptian Tell-el-Amarna of 1400-1200 BC. The Egyptian trade items of this period of time are well known to Spanish archaeology and almost surely may be associated with Phoenician intermediaries. As of the present date, such items may be taken as the earliest evidence of direct contact between Iberia and the eastern Mediterranean navigators.”

Hellenes in Iberia: Athena, Atlas, and Heracles with the golden apples of the Hesperides; marble relief, 5th century BCE

This is a “neat” example of the established historians’ ‘classic’ mentality: Reserved when they write or talk about Minoans, even Hellenes, but garrulous when they lecture about Phoenicians. Indeed, why was it so difficult for the Aegean peoples to reach Iberia? They were surely not inferior to the Phoenicians in seamanship and, furthermore, Crete was far closer to Iberia compared to Phoenicia. In addition, who controlled Mediterranean trade at the time? The Phoenicians or the Mycenaeans? Why should the Egyptian trade items of this period found in Spain “almost surely be associated with Phoenician intermediaries”? The crucial question, however, this mentality does not answer is: Where did the Bronze Age Mediterranean find tin to produce bronze? Who were established as sea traders in those years to transport this precious metal to the Mediterranean? Alas, not the Phoenicians! It is the reason why the evidence of their presence in Iberia is anything but “convincing”… On the other hand, there are detailed descriptions of Minoans extracting metals from the area of Lake Superior and carrying them through the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico to be transported to the Mediterranean! One cannot exclude this, but we do not intend to take you that far. It is better to remain on Iberian soil.

Where did the Bronze Age Mediterranean find tin to produce bronze?
Who were established as sea traders in those years to transport this precious metal to the Mediterranean?

Los Millares, by Marianne Weil, cast bronze (2008)

Some ‘non-established’ historians link the distinctive culture of Los MillaresinAlmería with “The Early Minoan Colonization of Spain” (W. Sheppard Baird). Far more interesting is the following El Argar culture, which also flourished in Almería, in modern eastern Andalusia, between 1800 and 1300 BCE. The Argaric culture was characterized by the early adoption of bronze, which allowed local dominance over ‘copper age’ (chalcolithic) neighbours. Their mining and metallurgy were quite advanced, with bronze, silver and gold being mined and worked for weapons and jewelry. They developed sophisticated ceramic techniques, as well, and traded with other tribes.

Argaric gold sword

The collective burial tradition, typical of European Megalithic Culture, was abandoned in favour of individual burials (and the tholos or ‘beehive’ tombs in favour of small cists). This trend seems to have come from the eastern Mediterranean, most likely from Mycenaeans (skipping Sicily and Italy, where the collective burial tradition remained for some time yet). In the next phase of this culture, beginning ca 1500 BCE, burial in pithoi (large jars) became most frequent. Again this custom (that never reached beyond the Argarians’ circle) must have come from Hellas, where it was used after circa 2000 BCE. Cultural exchanges during the Mycenaean era are very clear in the Mediterranean, with the Argarians adopting Greek funerary customs, while the Hellenes also imported the Iberian tholos for the same purpose.

Note that whoever reached Iberia could easily find the way to the tin ores of Brittany and Cornwall through the Western Iberian Bronze cultures that had some degree of interaction, not just among them, but also with other Atlantic cultures in Britain, France, etc. It is the so-called Atlantic Bronze Age complex of ca 1300–700 BC that consisted of different civilizations in Portugal, Andalusia, Galicia, Armorica (the part of Gaul that included Brittany), and the British Isles. The Atlantic Bronze Age was marked by economic and cultural exchange, which led to a high degree of cultural affinity manifested in the coastal communities from Galicia to Scotland, while commercial contacts extended from Scandinavia to the Mediterranean.

Heracles fighting Geryon, ca 540 BCE

Next important culture was that of Tartessos, a harbour city and the surrounding region in the southern Iberian coast (southern Andalusia). It was the first organized state of the peninsula, developed culturally and politically by the end of the 2nd millennium BCE. The area is referred to in the Greek mythology of the era as a reminder of the Mycenaean presence and campaigns in Iberia. Heracles went to perform two labours there: to kill Geryon and obtain his cattle; and to steal the golden apples of the Hesperides.(a) Geryon dwelt on Erytheia or Erytheis, an island of the Hesperides in the ‘far west’ of the ancient world: Hesperia was the West and more precisely Iberia; Erytheia was called one of the Hesperides, but also the fearsome giant’s daughter. “Geryon was killed by the great strength of Heracles at sea-circled Erytheis”, Hesiod says in his Theogony. Heracles set up two massive spires of stone to stabilize the area and ensure the safety of ships sailing through the Straits, called the Pillars of Heracles. He also founded Gadeira on Geryon’s island, where the Phoenicians would build later the colony of Gadir (modern Cádiz): a tumulus near Gadeira was associated with Geryon’s final resting-place. There are also legends about Heracles being buried in Spain. A later generation of Hellenes linked the area to Tartessos. The Fortunate Isles, also called the Isles of the Blessed, or Elysium, were thought to be somewhere outside the Pillars of Heracles, as well.(b) As regards Geryon, he is mentioned among the mythical kings of Tartessos. His grandson Norax (or Norace) conquered the south of Sardinia, founding the city of Nora, and becoming a hero of the Nuragic mythology.(c) He dictated the first laws, divided the society into seven classes, and forced the nobles to work. Later Gárgoris introduced commerce, beekeeping and new agricultural tools such as the plow. This last innovation is also credited to his (grand)son, Habis (Habido, Abidis, or Abidas), who succeeded him in the kingdom of Tartessos.

Heracles with nymphs, a satyr, and Pan in the Garden of the Hesperides, by Hesperides Painter, hydria (water jar), ca early 4th century BCE

(a) The Hesperides (Ἑσπερίδες) in Hellenic mythology were nymphs very fond of singing, who tended a blissful garden in a far western corner of the world, located near the Atlas Mountains in northwestern Africa, at the edge of the encircling Oceanus, the world-ocean. They were said to be the daughters of Hesperus, which means the Evening Star of the planet Venus, equivalent to vesper. They were three (like other Greek triads: the Graces and the Moerae, Fates): Aegle (“dazzling light”), Arethusa (“waterer”), and Erytheia (or Erytheis, “red one”). The Garden of the Hesperides was Hera’s orchard in the Occident, where either a single tree or a grove of immortality-giving “golden apples” grew. In later years it was thought that they might have actually been oranges, a fruit unknown to Europe and the Mediterranean before the Middle Ages. Under this assumption, the Hellenic botanical name chosen for all citrus species was hesperidoeidē (“hesperidoids”) – implying that they came from the Occident, while in reality their origin was the Orient (Southeast Asia)…

A traditional Rabelo boat in the Douro used for centuries to transport people and goods, mainly wine

Some peoples name the orange after Portugal, the former main source of imports: Greek portokali (πορτοκάλι), Bulgarian and Slav-Macedonian portokal, Romanian portocală and Georgian phortokhali. Also in South Italian dialects, orange is portogallo or purtualle. Related names are found in non-European languages, as well: Turkish portakal, Arabic al-burtuqal, Persian porteghal, and Amharic (the Ethiopian language) birtukan. Portugal’s name derives from the Roman Portus Calethat evolved into Portugale during the 7th and 8th centuries. Cale was an early settlement located at the mouth of the Douro River in the north of what is now Portugal. The etymology of the name Cale is mysterious, as is the identity of the town’s founders. Some historians have argued that Hellenes were the first to settle Cale and the name derives from the Hellenic word kallos (‘κάλλος’), ‘beauty’, referring to the beauty of the Douro valley. However, the mainstream explanation is that it is an ethnonym derived from the Callaeci or Gallaeci that lived in the area. The same applies to the names Galicia and Gaia, the twin city of Porto, at the Douro mouth.

Macaronesia: the Azores, Madeira, the Canaries and Cape Verde

(b) In the Fortunate Isles, or Isles of the Blessed, heroes and other favoured mortals in Greek and Celtic mythology were received into a winterless blissful paradise. These islands were thought to lie in the ‘Western Ocean’ near the encircling ‘River Oceanus’. Strabo located them opposite ‘Maurusia’ (Mauritania, Western Sahara and Morocco), beyond the end of the world, where neither snow nor heavy rains ever fell, with the beneficially invigorating cool breath of Zephyrus constantly blowing. Plutarch, referring to these isles several times in his writings, located them firmly in the Atlantic a few days’ sail from Iberia:

“The islands are said to be two in number separated by a very narrow strait and lie [2,000 kilometers] from Africa… A firm belief has made its way, even to the barbarians, that here are the Elysian Fields and the abode of the Blessed of which Homer sang.”

(c) The close relations between Iberia and Sardinia implied by mythology are confirmed by archaeological, architectural, linguistic, cultural and historical evidence. On the other hand, the Sardinians had contacts with the Mycenaeans, who traded throughout the western Mediterranean, and the Cretans, e.g. with Kydonia, modern Chania, as shown from pottery recovered in excavations in Sardinia. The influences, though, seem to have been even wider. The stepped pyramid of Monte d’Accoddi, near Sassari, is somehow similar to the monumental complex of Los Millares in Andalusia and some later edifices in the Balearic Islands. Some scholars see similarities even with Mesopotamian structures and attribute them to migrations, particularly of Sumerians, to the West. Ancient Greek historians and geographers described the mysterious megalithic nuraghe as daedaleia, implying there was a connection with Daedalus, who, after working in Crete and building the labyrinth there, settled in Sicily and then in Sardinia. During the Chalcolithic period, in the dawn of the Nuragic civilization in the 18th century BCE, copper was used to make weapons and other items. Soon the island, rich in mines, notably copper and lead, saw the construction of numerous furnaces for the production of alloys traded across the Mediterranean, most probably by Minoans and, later on, by Mycenaeans. The Nuragic people became skilled metal workers and were among the main metal producers in Europe. Passing to the Bronze Age, they started using this new alloy to make a wide variety of products, such as weapons, tools, even votive offerings, e.g. bronze vessels that show their close relationship with the sea. Sardinia was not on the map of tin sources and trade in ancient times (Cornwall-Devon, Brittany, Iberia, Bohemia–Saxony). However, because of its other mineral wealth, it served as a centre for metals trade at that time and likely actively imported tin from Iberia for export to the rest of the Mediterranean. Therefore, traders from the Aegean, as well as other areas where tin was scarce, very often travelled there. This fact can explain the cultural influences on the Nuragic civilization from Mycenae, Crete and Cyprus, as well as the presence of late Bronze Age Mycenaean, Cretan and Cypriot ceramics, and also locally made replicas, in half a dozen findspots that seem to have functioned as “gateway” communities.

Sardinian and Corsican tribes: the Corsi, perhaps from Liguria, moved to Corsica from N. Sardinia; the Balearic Balares, from Iberia or S. France, may be related with the Basques; the Iolei may originate in N. Africa, Sicily or E. Mediterranean. The Gallurese, Logudorese and Campidanese dialects correspond probably to these tribes.

The late Bronze Age (15th–13th centuries BCE) saw vast population migrations, such as that of the Sea Peoples who destroyed the Mycenaean and the Hittite worlds and also attacked Egypt (see the previous Chronicle 5). Some scholars say that the Sherden, one of the most important tribes of the Sea Peoples, are to be identified with the Nuragic Sardinians, who settled on the island either before or after the failed invasion of Egypt. These theories remain controversial for most archaeologists and historians. Simonides of Ceos, however, in a lost work reported by Zenobius, spoke of raids by Sardinians against Crete during the Sea Peoples’ invasion of Egypt. This would at least confirm that Nuragic Sardinians frequented the eastern Mediterranean at that time. Further proof comes from 13th century Nuragic ceramics found at Tiryns and in the Sicilian Agrigento area, along the sea route linking the western to the eastern part of mare nostrum. The second largest island in the Mediterranean after Sicily was called Ichnousa by the Greeks. It was probably named Sardinia after Sardus, a mythical hero of the Nuragic pantheon, who colonized the island from Libya. He is also associated with the Heracleidae that settled there led by Iolaus, a nephew of Heracles, according to Diodorus Siculus. Iolaus may have given rise to the tribe of Iolei, Iolaensi or Iliensi, who were repeatedly checked by the Carthaginians and the Romans, but they were never subdued. He also founded many cities from the Black Sea area to Sicily and Sardinia, requesting the assistance of Daedalus. Some of the latter’s edifices were still standing in Diodorus’ time (1st century BCE). The Phoenicians finally appeared in the area for the first time around 1000 BCE and began visiting Sardinia with increasing frequency. The most common ports of call where they dropped anchor were Caralis, Nora, Bithia, Sulcis, Tharros, and Olbia. From the 8th century they started founding (or appropriating) strongholds and cities primarily on the strategic southwest coasts of the island.

Launeddas

Sardinia, along with neighbouring Corsica, is a special case in terms of music, as well, cultivating one of the oldest forms of vocal polyphony – perhaps as ancient as the polyphony of Epirus and Albania. Unesco classed this kind of song, called cantu a tenore, as intangible world heritage in 2005. A similar style, cantu a cuncordu, corresponds to the Corsican paghjella and is liturgic in nature. The polyphonic tradition extends to the instruments of music. A typical polyphonic woodwind instrument made of three pipes is the launeddas (also called ‘triple clarinet’ or ‘triplepipe’). The pipes are played with circular breathing and the sound may be continuous. One of the pipes functions as a drone and the other two play the melody in thirds and sixths. Predecessors of the launeddas can be traced back to approximately 2700 BCE in Egypt, where reed pipes, depicted on tomb reliefs and pyramids, were originally called memet. The launeddas date back to at least the 8th century BCE and are still played in religious ceremonies and dances (su ballu). The musicians use extensive variations on a few melodic phrases, and a single tune can last over an hour, producing some of the “most elemental and resonant (sounds) in European music”, as Alessio Surian observed.

Cynetic writing with a human figure, 8th century BCE

Gárgoris is mentioned as a mythological king of one of the peoples of Tartessos, who lived in today’s Algarve and Low Alentejo of southern Portugal. They were the Cynetes, Cynesioi or Conii, the westernmost dwellers of Europe, according to Herodotus, who distinguished them from the Celts. Gárgoris, as the legend goes, had incestuous relations with his daughter, whose name has not survived. After she had got pregnant, he ordered that she should be locked up and the child be killed. The baby was abandoned on a hill close to a lair of wild animals, which instead breast-fed and protected him. When Gárgoris learned that his (grand)son was still alive, he ordered that he should be taken away from the cave and put to death in another way: in a stampede of cows, or devoured by dogs or hungry pigs, or thrown to the sea. Protected by Fortune, Habis managed to survive against all adversities. Raised by a hind and grown up like a savage, he became a skilful bandit, but was captured by peasants who led him to the king. Seeing his birthmarks, Gárgoris recognized he was his (grand)son. Impressed by his miraculous survival of all his ordeals, the king named him heir to the throne. Recorded by the Roman historian Trogus Pompeius, the legend was narrated in verse by Jerónimo de Arbolanche in his poem Abidas (1566). There are other versions of the myth, as well. In one of them Gárgoris is identified with Cronus eating his children, while his (grand)son is presented as persecuted for he introduced agriculture in pastoral Tartessos. A third variation, which found quite unexpectedly its way into a book about fado, covers up the incest factor, but embellishes the story with our cherished Homeric heroes (see also Voyage 3: Iberia’s Odyssey):

Map of the Lisbon area with Olisipo, Sintra, Escalabis or Scalabis, and Salacia, an ancient Roman town in present-day Alcácer do Sal

Gárgoris is identified with the Iberian king Gregoris mentioned by Mascarenhas Barreto in his bookFado – Lyrical Origins and Poetic Motivation.In his numerous mythological and historical digressional footnotes, he connects this monarch to Odysseus and Calypso, referring to the founding of Lisbon and Santarém:

“Legend attributes the building of the ancient walls of the city [Lisbon] to the great Greek hero of antiquity, Ulysses, king of Ithaca and conqueror of Troy, who is supposed to have given the place the name of Ulissea – whence the word Ulissipo. Anyway, what is certain is that Lisbon was inhabited by the Phoenicians around 600 BC and they named it Alis Ubbo, meaning ‘Calm Bay’.”

The founding of Santarém is thought to be correlated to that of Ulissea > Ulissipo > Olissipo > Olissipona > Lissibona > Lisboa.

“It is believed to have been founded in the 10th century BC by Abidis, of Greek origin, who gave it the name of Esca-Abidis”,Mascarenhas Barreto writes. “According to legend, this prince, grandson of Gregoris, king of the Iberian Peninsula, was also the son of Ulysses who, betraying the trust of Gregoris after having been given Alis Ubbo (Lisbon), secretly espoused Calypso, daughter of the peninsular king, who rushed with his army on Lisbon. Ulysses fled by sea, abandoning his spouse. When Abidis was born, Gregoris ordered him to be thrown in a cave to be devoured by wild beasts. In answer, however, to the entreaties of his daughter, he consented that the child should be delivered to Fate, according to primitive custom, and Abidis was put in a basket and taken away by the current of the river [Tagus]. A hind adopted him and when the child was later found in a wild state by some huntsmen, his mother recognized him by a mark. Gregoris forgot his former anger and gave him schooling, so that he could succeed him in the government of the peninsula. The name Esca-Abidis (Escalabis) in Greek means ‘food of Abidis’ in memory of the place where he was reared by the hind.”

“Legend attributes the building of the ancient walls of Lisbon to Ulysses, who is supposed to have given the place the name of Ulissea – whence Olissipo, Lissibona and Lisboa… Santarém is believed to have been founded in the 10th century BC by Abidis, of Greek origin [son of Ulysses and Calypso], who gave it the name of Esca-Abidis (Escalabis)… (Mascarenhas Barreto)

Once more, the stories about Hellenes are ‘legends’, those on Phoenicians ‘history’. Possibly true, there were no Greek settlements west of the Pillars of Heracles, only voyages of discovery. The myth of an ancient Hellenic foundation of Olisipo by Odysseus is not true. On the other hand, there is no evidence either to support the myth of a Phoenician foundation of Lisbon “around 600” or as far back as 1200 BCE under the name of Alis Ubbo (“Safe Harbour”), even if there were some organized settlements in Olissipona with clear Mediterranean influences either at that distant time or later. Likewise, contrary to myth, except the voyages of discovery, there is no record of Phoenician colonies beyond the Algarve, namely Balsa and Tavira, close to the Portuguese-Spanish border, with substantial Phoenician settlement and influence since the 8th century BCE. Essentially, Phoenician influence in modern Portugal was through cultural and commercial exchange with Tartessos.

As regards Calypso, according to the Greek mythology, she was not a princess but a nymph on the island of Ogygia, daughter of Atlas, hence she was also called Atlantis (Homer); or an Oceanid, that is, a daughter of Oceanus (Hesiod).(d) However, both versions are linked with either the Pillars of Heracles area or the Atlantic Ocean. Atlas, the Titan who held up the celestial sphere, was identified with the Atlas Mountains in northwest Africa. Scholars who have examined Homer’s work and geography, among them Strabo and Plutarch, have suggested that Ogygia and/or Scheria, the Phaeacians’ island, were located in the Atlantic, and some have identified either or both with Atlantis. Plutarch again writes specifically that “an isle Ogygian lies far out at sea, distant five days’ sail from Britain, going westwards”, and also mentions “the great continent”, which was interpreted as a reference to either America or an allusion to Plato’s Atlantis. Many traits of the Phaeacians, including their seamanship, are suggestive of either Minoan Crete or Atlantis. The description of their palace is that of a very advanced civilization. Above all, their ships were superb, quite different from the galleys of the Trojan War, and… steered by thought!(e) Hence the view that it was Homer before Plato who first spoke of Atlantis.

(d) Ogygia is linked to the Ogygian deluge and the mythical king of Attica and/or Boeotia, Ogyges, in the sense that Ogygian means ‘primeval’, ‘primal’, ‘at earliest dawn’. This means that Calypso’s island was primeval. Thus, when Aeschylus calls the NileOgygian, he does not suggest that the island was in Egypt, as some thoughtlessly thought…

(e) Homer describes the ships as faster than falcons, while King Alcinous explains to Odysseus what sort of information the ships require in order to take him home:

“Tell me your country, nation, and city, that our ships may shape their purpose accordingly and take you there. For the Phaeacians have no pilots; their vessels have no rudders as those of other nations have, but the ships themselves understand what it is that we are thinking about and want; they know all the cities and countries in the whole world, and can traverse the sea just as well even when it is covered with mist and cloud, so that there is no danger of being wrecked or coming to any harm.”

Back to Tartessos. This legendary land appears in Greek and Near Eastern sources circa the middle of the 1st millennium BCE. Most probably Homer was again the first one to refer in the Iliad to a gold-bearing land in the western limits of the world before the great ocean (Iberia) where wealthy people lived happily for many years. The Tartessian fortunate city, according to Herodotus, was beyond the Pillars of Heracles and had a king named Arganthonios, because of his wealth most probably.(f)

(f) The word Arganthonios is apparently based on the Indo-European word for silver and hence money. Tartessos was very rich in silver. Similar names appear in inscriptions of the Roman period and on silver coinage in Gaul. Arganthonios, the ‘Silver Man’ (ca 670–550 BCE), ruled Tartessos for 80 years (ca 630-550) and lived to be 120 years old. The idea of great age and length of reign may result from a succession of kings using the same name or title. Nevertheless, one could retort that he died… quite young, if we take into account that, as the Bible says, “all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty and nine [969] years”!

Another historian, Ephorus, described in the 4th century BCE “a very prosperous market called Tartessos, with much tin carried by river, as well as gold and copper from Celtic lands.” Around the end of the millennium, however, there are indications that the name fell out of use creating the impression that the city might have been lost due to natural or other causes. Apart from Thera, Tartessos is a strong candidate for the site of Atlantis. The two of them had probably more in common, namely Minoan influences. The Andalusians, just like the Hellenes, may have benefited from the Cretans not only economically, but culturally, as well. Archaeological discoveries there have built up a picture of a widespread culture, with the core area extending from the Guadalquivir valley to Huelva, but also covering the entire southern Iberia, from the mouth of the Tagus to Valencia. Pausanias, writing in the 2nd century CE, identified the river and gave details of the location of the city:

“They say that Tartessos is a river in the land of the Iberians, running down into the sea by two mouths, and that between these two mouths lies a city of the same name. The river is the largest in Iberia, and tidal, that of a later day called Baetis”, named Guadalquivir (‘Great River’) even later by the Moors.

The eastern mouth of the river, the only one existing now, was much wider at that time. The western mouth does not exist anymore, but it is thought that it was located near Huelva. In this area we now find only a number of lakes. At that time, between these two river arms, there was a large lagoon with at least one island in it where the legendary city was probably located. The landscape is completely different now. Some findings lead to the conclusion that there must have been two natural disasters (tsunamis) that caused the islands and the dry areas to sink, one of which happened around 1500 BCE and the other in 200 CE. Therefore, none of them is linked with the demise of Tartessos. Most sites were inexplicably abandoned between the late 6th and early 5th centuries BCE.

Geography of Tartessos and Iberia; 7th-5th century BCE

Strabo described an urbanized society with many flourishing, wealthy cities along the banks of the Tartessos (Guadalquivir) River. The Tartessians were very good in engineering, with a sophisticated system to regulate the river flow.

“They are considered to be the most educated of the Iberians, they have a scripture, even historical chronicles, poems, and laws in verse”, he wrote.(g)

(g) More about the ancient nomoi, that is, the very old tradition of laws in verse meant to be sung so as not to be forgotten by the people, see Chronicle 1.

Their culture is divided into two periods: The first is called “geometric” and coincides with the late Bronze Age ranging from 1200 to 750 BCE – exactly corresponding to the Greek geometric art (Parallel Lives? Who knows…). The second is termed “oriental”, influenced by Phoenicians and Hellenes alike, ranging from 750 to 550 BCE, when it was superseded by the classic Iberian culture. A similar shift to the Lusitanian culture occurred in the southern Portuguese territory, mainly in the Algarve and Low Alentejo, with littoral extensions up to the Tagus mouth. Significant elements of the period were the introduction of the potter’s wheel, and other major advances in craftsmanship, e.g. architecture, and also in agriculture. Another noticeable element was the increase in specialization and stratification. A very important development was writing. With the arrival of the Hellenes, whose influence extended far beyond their colonies, this ‘orientalism’ began to transform itself into the Iberian culture, especially in the South East. The Greek influence is visible in the gradual change of the style of the monuments approaching more and more the architectural models of the Hellenic world. The Iberian script evolved from the Tartessian with noticeable Greek influences. A variant of the Hellenic alphabet (Ibero-Ionian script) was used in a few cases to write Iberian, as well.

Culture (from Cicero’s “cultura animi”) is also material, denoting the artifacts a society creates and their connection to social relations. Civilization is certainly inconceivable without division of labour and technology. Culture and civilization necessitate an economic base in order to thrive. In the case of Iberia, it was the metals that opened the way to the dawn of the Bronze Age, sped up later when some Easterners arrived there. Mining and smelting preceded the coming of Minoans, Greeks, or Phoenicians. Alluvial tin was panned in the Tartessian streams from an early date. The Río Tinto mines along the river, which flows into the Gulf of Cádiz at Huelva, are estimated at 8,000 to 10,000 years old. They have been mined for copper, silver, gold, and other minerals by Iberians, Tartessians, Phoenicians, Hellenes, Romans, Visigoths, Moors and Spaniards, for such a long time that the place has turned into an environmental disaster zone.(h) The invention of coinage in the 7th century BCE intensified the search for bronze and silver. Hence trade links, formerly largely in elite goods, assumed a broader economic role. By that time, silver extraction in Huelva Province reached industrial proportions. Huelva city was certainly connected to Tartessos; it contains the largest accumulation of imported elite goods and must have been an important centre. Excavations in the heart of the city revealed a great industrial and commercial emporium lasting several centuries. Some 90,000 ceramic fragments, indigenous and imported (Phoenician and Greek), were exhumed. This pottery, dated from the 10th to the 8th centuries BCE, precedes finds from other Phoenician emporia. The existence of foreign produce and materials together with local ones permits us to imagine its old harbour as a major hub for the reception, manufacture and shipping of diverse products of various and distant origin. Finds in other parts of the city help us estimate its habitat in some 20 hectares, which constitutes a sizable extension for a site in Iberia during that period. The analysis of written sources and the products exhumed, including thousands of Hellenic ceramics, some of which are works of excellent quality by known potters and painters, tends to identify this habitat with the lost city of Tartessos.

Río Tinto: beautiful colours but… poisonous!

(h) The Tinto area, after its exploitation for ten millennia, looks like a “lunar landscape” or even worse: Recently it has gained scientific interest due to the presence of so-called extremophileaerobic bacteria that dwell in the water. The extreme conditions there may be analogous to other locations in the solar system thought to contain liquid water, such as subterranean Mars, or Jupiter’s moon Europa, where an acidic ocean of water is theorized to exist under its ice surface. Thus the river is of interest to astrobiologists.

El Corazón de la Tierra: the Heart of the Earth (uprooted)

Based partially on research done near the Río Tinto, two NASA scientists reported in 2005 they had found strong evidence of present life on Mars! They were obliged to retract, but who knows? The Americans may one day employ… Martians as slaves! That is why Europe, eternally in the role of a satellite, is already being transmuted into… Europa, moving inexorably towards the gates of El Dorado vigilantly guarded by Cerberus!